Elections Canada posted the final candidates list for each riding on September 1. Based on this information, I figured I don't expect anything to change before election day, so I decided to vote by mail.
To vote by mail, you need to include a picture of your ID. A scan of my Ontario Photo Card worked, even though the card had expired during the pandemic. (Ontario decreed that ID expiring during the pandemic is still valid.) I'm not able to independently assess any better than you are how safe sending a photo of your ID over the Elections Canada website may or may not be.
(Weirdly, gender is also a required field on the application for a mail-in ballot)
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I sent in my application late at night on September 1, and by noon September 2 my status on the Elections Canada was "Registration status: Accepted. Voting kit sent".
The voting kit was waiting for me in my mailbox on September 7, alongside my voter registration card.
The voting kit doesn't contain a ballot with the names of all the candidates in your riding. Instead, it contains a blank card for you to write the name of the candidate you're voting for, meaning you're responsible for looking up the candidates' names yourself.
(Journalism Wanted: how much leeway do the people counting the ballots have regarding misspellings, etc.?)
You put the card with the name in one of the envelopes provided, then put that in a second envelope bearing identification numbers, which you sign and date. Then you put that in a third envelope bearing the address of the local Elections Canada office and prepaid postage.
I put my ballot in the mailbox at some point on the weekend of September 11-12, and the status on the Election Canada site changed to "Complete ballot received" on September 15.
Then, just minutes after I got that update, one of the candidates on my riding resigned. So much for "I don't expect anything to change before election day"!
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