Votes will be counted in two phases after closing time.

As a first step, votes on the respective questions will be counted one by one by the returning boards, according to the following categories: ANNULLED ballots, VALID ballots, which category includes YES and NO ballots, and eventually the CONTESTABLE ballots. All these data will be entered into a data-form representing the First Phase of the returning operations. As there are many contestable ballots that need long consideration to tell whether they are valid or not, these ballots will be separately registered under separate heads in the data-forms by the returning boards. Returning Boards will decide about contestable ballots only after having forwarded these data-forms. The function of these forms is to inform the public and the election bodies about the preliminary results in the very night of voting, as soon as possible. This is why data-forms must be forwarded through the computer system to the National Election Center as quickly as possible after polling has been closed down. The National Election Team announces the preliminary results during the night after voting. They use data supplied by the electronical vote-counting system.

After returning boards have decided about all contested ballots, final results will be registered in Polling Ward Protocols. This is the Second Phase of the returning operations. Polling Ward Protocols must be forwarded to the National Election Committee until 3 p.m. of the second day after referendum's day. The final results will be established by the National Election Committee on the basis of Polling Circle Protocols.

In the course of the referendum, Polling Ward report three times during the day about participation. Data related to participation will appear at 11 a.m., 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. in the electronical information system. Data will appear in county and settlement configuration.

In the night after polling has been closed, there will be a continuous flow of information about the newest preliminary results to be found in the electronical system. You will find break-downs for the individual settlements, counties and the whole country. Final results of the referendum appear in the system immediatley after they have been announced.

Computer netwoks working in each central settlement of the individual parliamentary electoral districts (Hungarian abbreviation: OEVK) play perhaps the most important role in data processing during the referendum. It is in these centers that data about the given electoral district (OEKV) will be fed into the system and saved, on the basis of the data-forms and protocols coming in one after the other. As regards the PC-configuration in charge of data-processing, and as to the network-structure ensuring on-line connections at the national level, see Attachment No.1 and Attachment No. 2 shows you all structures and connections that ensure the functioning of the vote counting and returning system at the national level during the night of the referendum.