Virginia voters who make a mistake filling out their absentee ballots for the November election are getting a chance to correct errors, like a missing signature, that might ordinarily lead to their votes getting rejected.

A new law in effect for this election cycle sets up what’s known as a ballot “cure” process, requiring that election officials reach out to voters whose ballots have been flagged because of errors. It’s one of a series of voting-related policies that Democrats advanced during a special legislative session that started in August and is beginning to wrap up.

D.C. and Maryland also have a method to cure ballots, election officials said.

More than 760,000 people have returned absentee ballots in Virginia so far, either via drop boxes or through the mail. Most have done so without issue, and local jurisdictions are often seeing less than 1% of ballots with paperwork errors.

But election officials say they want every vote to count. And because of the coronavirus pandemic, an unprecedented number of people will vote by mail this year, many for the first time.

“It is important, especially this year because we do have a lot of people who are choosing to vote by mail that are doing it for the first time. So they’re not familiar with the process,” Judy Brown, the general registrar for Loudoun County, said.

Brown says Loudoun has successfully reduced its ballot rejection rate in recent years by offering voters information on some of the most common mistakes. Still, contacting voters does mean more administrative work for election staff. But Brown says voters are happy that someone has “taken the time to reach out to them.”

“Everyone wants their vote to count,” she said.

The county had received around 46,700 mail ballots as of late last week, and 432 needed some type of correction. That’s less than 1% of the total. In Fairfax County, around 1,300 out of 144,000 received had errors, also slightly under 1% of the ballots.

In past years, most voters wouldn’t know their ballot had been rejected until after the election, officials said. Staff received ballots, flagged potential errors and set them aside. On Election Day, an election official adjudicated ballots to determine if they should be counted or rejected.

Now, someone must reach out to voters within three days by phone, email or in writing to inform them of a ballot error, according to the legislation. Voters have until noon on Nov. 6 to fix the problem.

Common errors include voters skipping a field on the form, like their address, or forgetting to sign. Some have also forgotten to seal their ballot in the “envelope B” or “secrecy sleeve” — a process used in 16 states.

Officials, however, will not flag ballots for a missing witness signature because Virginia has eliminated that requirement for this electron.

At least eighteen states and D.C. have a process that allowed voters to “cure” their ballots, according to the League of Women Voters. Several other states have developed a policy specifically for this election. Maryland developed a formal cure process during the June primary, according a spokesperson for the State Board of Elections.

The League of Women Voters has also filed lawsuits in some states seeking to create a “notice and cure” process.

“More people are applying for absentee ballots and wanting to participate in this way,” says Celina Stewart, the senior director of advocacy and litigation for the League of Women Voters. “And this was a way to make sure we work with voters to enfranchise as many as possible.”

Having a way for voters to correct errors is important as millions vote by mail for the first time, Stewart says, “but the other thing is that the rejection rate… affects minorities more than any other voters.”

In North Carolina, a study found Black voters are having their ballots rejected at twice the rate of white voters. The rate of ballot rejection varies across the country. But with so many American voting by mail this year, the number of rejected ballots could reach historic highs.

More than 550,000 ballots were rejected across the country during this year’s presidential primaries, according to an analysis by NPR, because of errors or because they arrived too late. That’s more than the approximately 319,000 ballots rejected in the 2016 general election. (There has also been a flurry of legal activity around deadlines for mail-in ballots to be received.)

During the June primaries in D.C., roughly 1% of absentee ballots were rejected, most because of signature issues. And so far, about 1% have been flagged in this election, according to the Board of Elections.

D.C. verifies signatures on mail ballots by electronically checking them against signatures on file at the DMV, in voter registration files or other databases. If there is a discrepancy that would lead to rejection, election officials contact voters with a chance to cure the ballot, or essentially verify it is actually theirs.

The ballot cure process is one of several ways Virginia’s elections will be different this year, and one of the many ways Democrats have reshaped the voting landscape in the commonwealth. Even before the pandemic, they passed laws to expand the acceptable IDs needed to vote, to allow anyone to vote early beginning 45 days before the election (in the past, an excuse was required), and to make Election Day a state holiday.

Gov. Ralph Northam proposed additional measures to run the November elections during a pandemic. Last month, during a special session, lawmakers passed a bill that put $2 million toward prepaid postage for absentee ballots; set up ballot drop boxes; and created the process to correct absentee ballots.

Nearly two million people have already voted in Virginia, either early in-person or by mail.