Home Affairs will open all front offices from 08:00 to 18:00 on 2 and 3 November, and 07:00 to 21:00 on election day, it said on Tuesday.
The department said the longer hours will let eligible voters collect finished identity documents, apply for new ones or get a Temporary Identity Certificate (TIC) where one applies. The Local Government Elections are on 4 November 2026.
The election-day hours are in alignment with those of the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC), according to the statement. The 08:00 to 18:00 window on 2 and 3 November applies to the same services.
The department did not publish a list of offices or a count of documents waiting for collection. The statement covers all of its front offices and gives no separate hours for individual branches.
The statement asks people who have applied for an identity document to collect it and “exercise their right to vote”. It also asks stakeholder forums, community structures and community leaders to work with communities so that eligible voters collect their documents or obtain temporary documentation before election day.
The overlap with special voting is the part that affects the most people. The IEC said on 14 October that it had approved 2,655,067 special vote applications, up 131% on the 1,147,759 approved in 2021. Of those, 678,525 are home visits for voters who cannot travel to a station, and the rest are voting-station special votes. Special voting, which we covered in our story on the record 2.65 million special votes, takes place on 2 and 3 November, the first two days of the extended Home Affairs hours.
Those figures describe how many people will vote early. They do not say how many of them are waiting on an identity document, and Home Affairs has not published that number either.
The IEC said on 14 October that all 23,696 voting stations had been secured, and that more than 66% of the 79 million ballot papers had been printed by then, with printing due to finish on 18 October. Its briefing did not address identity documents.
The statement is aimed at people who applied for an identity document but have not yet collected it.
The extended hours apply to the department’s own front offices. Smart ID applications at bank branches, covered in our story on the one million customers served since March, are not part of the announcement.
The next step is on Monday 2 November, when the extended hours and special voting start on the same day. Election day is Wednesday 4 November.
