Legal Definitions - tally

A tally refers to a current count or a record of items, events, or scores. While historically originating from physical methods of record-keeping, such as notched sticks used to track debts or transactions, today the term is broadly used to describe the act of counting or the resulting total.

Here are some examples illustrating the use of "tally":

• Inventory Management: A warehouse supervisor needs to determine the exact number of a specific electronic component available before placing a new order. They instruct their team to perform a physical count of all units in stock.

  This process of counting each component is referred to as taking a "tally." The final number reported by the team, representing the total quantity of components, is also called the "tally" for that item.

• Election Results: During a local election, volunteers at a polling station are responsible for counting the ballots cast for each candidate after the polls close.

  As they sort and count the votes, they are "tallying" the results. The running total of votes for each candidate, updated periodically and displayed to the public, represents their current "tally" in the election.

• Project Progress Tracking: A software development team tracks the number of bugs or defects identified in a new application during its testing phase.

  Each time a new bug is reported and confirmed, it is added to the count. The cumulative number of bugs found by the end of the testing phase is the "tally" for that project, indicating the quality and stability of the software.