Writing a year off after regularly consulting ballot box (7,4)
I believe the answer is:
penalty area
'box' is the definition.
(I know that penalty area is a type of box)
'writing a year off after regularly consulting ballot' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'writing' could be 'pen' and 'pen' is located in the answer.
'a' could be 'area' (maths abbreviation) and 'area' is found in the answer.
'year' could be 'y' and 'y' is found in the answer.
The remaining letters 'alt' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for penalty area that I've seen before include "Football's box" , "Region in front of a goalkeeper" , "The 18-yard box" , "It's adjacent to goal" .)