Information Access Advocacy
Guidelines: Eight Steps to Web Accessibility
Prepared by the Blind Citizens
This version: Approved by
Purpose and Scope of These Guidelines
This document provides a
set of guidelines that can be used by blind and vision-impaired people in order
to effectively advocate for access and increased accessibility to information
and services on the World Wide Web (WWW). This is a set of guidelines only.
They represent what the
These guidelines can be
used effectively by any blind or vision-impaired person regardless of their
level of knowledge and experience with computers or the Internet. These
guidelines are designed to assist you as a user of web services. These
guidelines have a specific scope for web sites that fall under Australian
jurisdiction. However, we recognise that the approach and principles are
applicable for advocacy on sites outside
These guidelines are
designed as a tool that can be used by itself, or in conjunction with lodging a
complaint under the Disability Discrimination Act (1992). Note that as an
individual, you have the right to lodge a DDA
complaint at any time, either apart from, in conjunction with or following any
or all of these guidelines.
While the
Eight Steps to Web Accessibility
Step 1: Identify the problems in terms of what you
cannot do on the given web site
Step
6: Provide the organisation with assistance and resources to help them solve
the problems
Guidelines Explained in our step-by-step approach
If you are having
difficulties browsing a site or web pages on the Internet, try to identify
exactly what it is you cannot do. This can be understood in very simple terms
such as "I hear gibberish when tabbing between graphical links, so I
cannot tell what the links are for," or "I cannot find a way to
navigate to the screens for paying my bills."
If possible, try to
identify as much specific detail on your problem as you can, as this will
assist your progress. If you are an experienced web user, or have some
knowledge in web technologies, you may be able to determine the problems in
some detail.
If you know of other
similar web sites or web services that are accessible or that have worked for
you in the past, visit those sites to confirm that you are still able to work
with them. This allows you to confirm that your system is functioning properly
and that you can browse similar content when it is accessible.
This step also gives you
information on the kinds of interactions that are possible and that do work, so
you can compare this with the interactions on the site you are having problems
with. It also allows you to develop an idea of the degree to which other
similar web services and similar content is able to be designed in an
accessible way, which will in turn assist you with any negotiations you may
have with the provider of the web service, (see steps 5 through 7).
As some issues of access
are directly related to the combination of software and hardware that you are
using, it is handy to have this information at your fingertips when consulting
blindness agencies or experienced blind web users. In fact, questions about
your screen reader or magnifier version and browser version are often the first
questions asked of you by others who are working to assist you.
If you are having problems
accessing a web site, there may be important issues related to your Operating
System, Browser or assistive technology. Check what operating system you are
using, including version and service pack (for example, Windows XP
Professional, Service Pack 2). If you are using a screen reader, (for example,
JAWS from Freedom
Scientific or Window-Eyes from GW Micro), some of the issues around access can be linked
to the compatibility of the screen reader version and the version of the
browser (that is, Internet Explorer) you are using. Also check your graphics
and sound cards and drivers as these can have some effect on the problems you
are having.
If you do not know how
to gather this information, you can ask the blindness agencies or other
experienced blind web users to help you do this as part of the assistance you
request through step 4 below.
Now that you have an
idea of your problems and what you cannot do on the given web site in simple
terms, and hopefully you have information about your Operating System and other
technologies, you can approach Australian blindness service agencies, or you
can approach other blind friends who are experienced using the web to ask them
about your problems. There are a number of email mailing lists you can join
(for example, VIP-l and JAWS and Window-Eyes specific lists) where you can ask
a community of users to assist you. To join VIP-l, send an e-mail to majordomo@softspeak.com.au
with the phrase "Subscribe vip-l" in the
body of the email (without the quotes).
When asking for
assistance, describe your problems (from step 1) and try to give an indication
of what you may have already tried to do to resolve your problems. It is worth
mentioning that you have tried other similar sites (step 2) and that you have
identified your operating system, browser and assistive technologies, (step 3).
Include all of this information in the email for assistance, or have this
information handy when speaking to people on the phone.
Of course, as mentioned
above, if you have difficulties with identifying the versions of your operating
system, browser and assistive technology, you can request for assistance on how
to do this.
You may need to iterate
over this step of requesting assistance a number of times, as you may need to
try a number of strategies that could solve your problems, but could also
prompt some further questions or issues that require further assistance.
Through this process of
consultation, you may even be offered some IT training courses at the blindness
agencies. Consider these courses as an opportunity to enhance your web skills
and to give you the confidence in knowing how to determine if problems
encountered with web sites are due to the inaccessible web site rather than any
difficulties particular to your own situation.
You should also use this
opportunity to undertake wider research on the web to find useful blindness and
web accessibility resources, as these resources will be useful to you with your
advocacy in steps 5 through 8, as well as for the future.
Once you have completed
steps 1 through 4, you should have a reasonable idea of the issues and problems
you have with accessing the web site that are really due to the design of the
web site itself. It is important to have some idea of this when you approach
the organisation responsible for delivering the site because it shows that you
have already made reasonable attempts to access the site and that the issues
you are bringing to this discussion are issues directly related to the site
itself. Importantly, because you have moved through steps 1 to 4, you can
demonstrate with evidence what is truly wrong with the site.
Try to determine the
responsible parties for the delivery of the web service, (for example, the
company or organisation delivering the site). There may be available methods to
make general enquiries by phone or email. Use these avenues of communication
being sure to document every point of contact you have with the organisation in
terms of the person that you corresponded with, the date and time of contact
and the outcomes or promises made resulting from that contact. Many
organisations using call centres may have a mechanism whereby you can obtain a
“receipt” or “reference” number for the conversation you have had. Keep a
record of these numbers and the names of the people you spoke with as this
provides a trail of evidence that you can use to demonstrate your attempts to
contact the organisation to resolve your issues with them.
Some sites are developed
by a web development company, but delivered as services from another organisation.
If the organisation responsible for delivering the site provides you with a way
of contacting these external developers, consider using these avenues of
communication, but remember that the responsible organisation cannot pass off
responsibility by suggesting that the inaccessibility of the site is the
responsibility of the external developers. The organisation delivering the web
site and services is completely responsible when it comes to the accessibility
of it’s sites to it’s customers, and the external
developers are only under contract to deliver to that organisation.
So your focus should be
on making contact with the appropriate decision makers in the company
delivering the service and the developers themselves. Therefore, do not be too
discouraged if your first attempt of contact was with a call centre phone
operator who did not know how to answer your queries. Just keep track of all
your correspondence and ask questions to those people who can answer them with
a view to finally making contact with the people you need to talk to.
When approaching the
organisation, explain your problem by describing what you cannot do, (step 1),
in a clear, step-by-step approach. Try to show how you cannot achieve a
particular goal or task on the web site. Also try to describe what needs to
work and what might be done to solve the problem if you are able to present
this information. Some of this information may be available to you because of
your work through steps 1 to 4 prior to contacting the organisation. Through
your work in step 2, you may also be able to demonstrate that other similar web
services are available and that they are accessible, which means the
organisation must understand that it is possible to design the given type of
service or content in an accessible way.
If you happen to be in
contact with an organisation based outside
Some very; large
organisations have many business units or areas that take responsibility for
different aspects of products or customer service. Often, when corresponding
with an organisation, you may find that you are passed from one person to
another. While this process can assist you in getting to the right person, it
is important to not allow the process to serve merely as a mechanism by which
your issues get buried in a circular process resulting in no progress for you.
If this is happening,
you might point out that while you understand an organisation to have many
business units and different areas of responsibility, your issues as a customer
are important to the company’s customer service commitments. The way that an
organisation chooses to do business internally is up to them, but this is not
so relevant to a customer who is trying to access the web services, and in many
cases paying money to do so. This may mean you have to move up the
organisational hierarchy somewhat to make contact with a high-level person, and
in this instance you would be perfectly justified in doing so.
It is also worth doing
some research on the company in question to see if they have any known
commitments to accessibility, accessibility standards or action plans, or any
Disability Service groups within the company. Knowing about any such
commitments is useful as it can provide you with a way to develop profile for
your issues within the organisation. If the organisation does have these
accessibility commitments, then there are known reasons why they ought to do
their best to assist you.
Try to provide resources
which would help the web developer to solve the problems, For example, the Web
Accessibility Initiative (WAI) of the W3C is at http://www.w3.org/WAI,
and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (version 1.0) can be found in the
resources section of the WAI site.
Also be clear to point
out the cost-benefit of doing accessibility. Some of this information may be
apparent to you because of your initial progress with steps 1 through 4, but it
is worth trying to gather some resources such as URLs, businesses that provide
web accessibility consultancy, and information about accessibility, even though
you might not know a lot about this yourself.
It is worth informing
the organisation of the benefits to the organisation of ensuring that web
services are accessible. One of these benefits is that the market of customers
can increase to include people with Disabilities. According to the ABS (2003),
approximately 20% of people in
Also, providing
accessible web services can provide a competitive advantage for obtaining and
retaining these customers, who are likely to be quite loyal to a company that
provides accessible web services in an environment where some organisations are
not doing accessibility this in an adequate way. For more information on the cost-benefit
analysis of web accessibility, refer to the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative
Education and Outreach working group’s activities from the WAI
web site mentioned in step 6 above.
If there seems to be
some resistance to progress on the issues for you after some time, you can also
begin to point out the risk under the Disability Discrimination Act (1992) of
not providing accessible services. If you need to know more about the DDA, contact the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity
Commission (HREOC). The Australian HREOC is at http://www.hreoc.gov.au. The Disability Discrimination
Act (DDA) can be found on the HREOC
web site.
It is worth noting a
precedent case in
As discussed in Step 6
above, organisational activities and product-by-product responsibilities may be
separated from each other, and different working groups or business units in a
large organisation may have boundaries of responsibilities, but the risks to
the organisation of not delivering accessible sites do not have these same
boundaries. The whole organisation and it’s customer
service reputation, market share and customer base may be adversely effected if
the company does not make progress towards accessibility.
As also discussed in
step 6 above, knowing if the organisation has disability action plans and known
commitments to accessibility can be of significant assistance to your advocacy.
Given that you have made
the conciliatory approach as described in Steps 5 through 7 on the basis of
your work through Steps 1 to 4, and you have done this for a reasonable time
and with reasonable persistence, being sure to record all of your interactions
with the organisations in question. If you find that the results are not
satisfactory and that you have not made progress due to the lack of cooperation
and reasonable attempts to solve the problems on the part of the organisation
delivering the web service, you have the option of lodging a complaint to the HREOC under the DDA. Consult with
the HREOC and/or BCA’s
legal officer for assistance with lodging these complaints.
If you have undertaken
an approach such as our suggested Steps 1 through 7, you should have all the
information and evidence required for a successful DDA
complaint. One of the important contributing factors to the success of these
complaints is the degree to which you can demonstrate that the problems you are
having stemmed from the web service in question and that you have made
reasonable attempts to solve the problems locally with the organisation in
question. The other important factor is to provide evidence of this in the form
of dates and times when you have contacted the organisation, the discussion you
had, the results of that discussion and a demonstration of what happened when
you followed the discussion up with further contact.
Thus, our approach
strengthens your advocacy and the likelihood of positive outcomes, with or
without the need to take formal action under the DDA.
Copyright (C) 2000-2005,
BCA