Accessibility

Accessibility statement for iow.gov.uk

This website is run by the Isle of Wight Council. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website.

That means you should be able to:

  • zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
  • navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader

We have also written our website text to be as simple as possible to understand.

AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use. This includes how to change colours, contrast levels and fonts.

This accessibility statement does not cover the following:

  • Other council websites, such as 1LeisureDinosaur Isle and SENDIASS.
  • Commissioned services (services that the council pays other organisations to deliver).
  • Partner websites and applications.

The website has been designed to comply with accessibility standards, be customer-centred and provide customer journeys that are simple and easy to use. We still have a few outstanding service specific applications which do not meet the same standards and are currently being revised to do so.  This Accessibility Statement will be updated as we make those improvements.

Areas of non compliance

This website is not currently fully compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard as we still have some links to applications on our old website. As mentioned, we are in the process of updating these. In addition, we are working on PDFs.

Most PDF content is not fully accessible. We are reviewing our PDF documents, making them accessible, and hoping to convert most to web pages.

Feedback and contact information

Please let us know if you have accessibility problems with our website, we welcome your input and are keen to make sure that our information is available to all.

You can get in touch in the following ways:

Please provide a description of the problem and, if possible, include the web page address (URL) where the problem happens. If you’d prefer to discuss the problem face to face please let us know when you get in touch.

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the 'accessibility regulations').

If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

Third party applications - disproportionate burden

Some of our applications and forms are built and hosted through third party software where we cannot directly make changes to the applications ourselves. We have not been able to fix these issues in the past as it placed a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. However, we are working with suppliers to remedy this and will update this statement with improvements.

These include:

  • Our credit card and bill payment services, Isle of Wight Council Secure Payments, are supplied by Capita. This system is not fully accessible due to:
    • no language attribute on the <html> tag
    • not all images have alternative text
    • some pages use a timed refresh
  • Our planning system is provided by IDOX on our behalf  and is not fully compliant due to issues with sufficient colour contrast on some sections of this application.
  • Our Registrars appointment booking system is provided on our behalf by Stopford, it currently has some minor accessibility issues and we are working with the provider to fix these issues.

Content that's not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

Information made available through our archives and archive documents are not within the scope of the regulations. Please email: digitalcontent@iow.gov.uk for help accessing this information.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This accessibility statement was prepared on 19 April 2023.