THE first four days of early voting in Wodonga has seen numbers soar compared to the same period of the 2016 federal election.
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There were 6519 who voted from Monday to Thursday this week, with 3268 doing so over the comparable time of the last poll.
The stark jump was highlighted with 1868 voting on the first day, nearly double the 969 of 2016.
The trend of more early voting is also apparent at the Albury and Wangaratta prepoll stations which opened a week earlier than Wodonga on April 29.
Since then in Albury there's been 5891 ballots, up from 4852, and in Wangaratta 8050, up from 6585.
The record numbers voting before election day has prompted concern the period for prepolling is too long and changing the way parties announce commitments.
Retiring Indi MP Cathy McGowan she said she is "very happy" with the current set-up and believes it advantages independents.
"For the major parties they're caught up on their campaign launches and promises, but for us it doesn't matter," Ms McGowan said.
"The parties don't like it because they've got to find volunteers and they don't have the support we have."
Nationals Indi candidate Mark Byatt believes a two-week period for all prepolling sites would be preferable.
"It's increasingly difficult to get volunteers to resource the booths," Mr Byatt said.
Voters at Wodonga on Friday had various reasons for numbering the boxes early.
Reasons included football, holidays, health and for Wodonga plant seller Sandra Exelby an adventure.
"I'm flying to Paraguay in South America on Sunday to do a conservation internship for three months (on threatened water birds)," she said.