Please help me re the census — a census worker came to my home yesterday and I noticed she was filling it out IN PENCIL !!
I protested and asked her to use ink. She said that the machine can read only the lead in the pencil. I replied that it was ridiculous and dangerous to fill out an official form in pencil because then anyone could erase and change the answers. She ssid she worked for the federal gov’t and that this was the way it was.
I told her that I didn’t care and to go away and come back with a pen.
Is this nuts, or what?
fill out an official form in pencil
... well, think back to your school test days... the non-working software reading all the questionaires for the census reads #2 pencil via scanner, so NO info is done in ink, and yes, pencil responses can be erased, and corrected... or changed. Standard procedure across the US for Census2010, your tax dollars at work.
ymmv
The ones that I filled out and mailed back were done in ink. I don’t recall anything on them saying that you had to use pencil.
I think you did right. Did she go away? She’ll probably just go fill it out however she wants and turn it in. She’ll mark you off as having cooperated. yay for you!