Voting papers are due to start arriving at BECTU members' homes as elections begin for president and National Executive.
The ballot is being run by Electoral Reform Ballot Services, an approved independent scrutineer, and votes need to be returned by the April 30 deadline.
Voters in every part of the union will be able to choose between two candidates for the presidency, but only two sections of the union are also running ballots for seats on the union's National Executive Committee (NEC).
Members of the BBC Division, and the London Production Division, will be receiving a second ballot paper to elect their representatives on the NEC. Both presidential contenders are asking members in their own divisions to support them in the NEC ballots, in addition to the union-wide election of president.
Two-yearly elections for NEC seats have been a feature of BECTU's democracy since the union was founded in 1991, but this is only the second time that members have voted directly for the President. Until 2002 BECTU, like many other UK unions, used to elect its president from within the NEC, but the rules had to be changed after a legal challenge.
