Labour MP Willow-Jean Prime is sounding the alarm after discovering she was moved on to the dormant electoral roll earlier this year without her knowledge.

Chief Electoral Officer Karl Le Quesne on Monday revealed about 115,000 people were currently on the dormant roll. That is about 25 percent lower than the same time in the 2023 election cycle, but Le Quesne said it was still "not good enough."

People were typically shifted onto the dormant roll if the Electoral Commission had tried and failed to get in touch them.

Voters would still be able to cast a ballot, but would have to go through the special vote process and would not be sent an EasyVote card.

Prime told RNZ she only discovered her dormant enrolment status "by chance" when she checked online in June, only to be told: "You are not currently enrolled", which she said was "misleading."

She said she had earlier been emailed and texted by the commission asking her to update her details, but she did not because they were all correct.

"I did what they told me to do, and every time I went on there, my details were correct. I hadn't moved."

Prime said the whole situation felt "a bit messy".

"My concern is: if that happened to me as a member of Parliament, how many other Māori has this happened to?" Prime said.

"This is our election. People have to have confidence in our electoral system with the changes to the electoral law from this government."

About 5000 voters of Māori descent were moved onto the dormant electoral roll since the end of March this year.

"It's hugely disappointing that thousands of Māori voters have been moved to the dormant roll, potentially without knowing and through no fault of their own," Prime said.

She was worried for people who were told they're not enrolled, as they "might not bother to vote at all."

Speaking to reporters on Monday, Le Quesne described the dormant roll as a "safety net".

In a statement to RNZ, Electoral Commission deputy chief executive for operations Anusha Guler said it would be "unusual" for someone to be asked to update their details they had not moved house, as Prime had.

She encouraged anyone in that situation to contact the commission on 0800 36 76 56.

Guler said if a person on the dormant roll turned up to vote, staff would look them up on the electronic roll and direct them to cast a "special vote" instead.

She said the main reason people ended up on the dormant roll was because they had moved house and not updated their enrolment details.

The Electoral Commission would first try to contact anyone whose mail was returned as undeliverable.

If it had an email address or mobile phone number for the voter, it would send them a message telling them their address appeared to be out of date and asking them to update their details.

After four weeks, if the voter had not responded, they would be removed from the main roll and placed on the dormant roll.

Guler said a reminder text would be sent in late August to everyone on the dormant roll for whom the commission had a mobile number, asking them to update their details.

A voter could return to the main roll as soon as they confirmed their address through vote.nz or by completing an enrolment form.

If the Electoral Commission was unable to contact someone on the dormant roll for three years, they were removed from the electoral roll entirely.