Accessibility

This accessibility statement applies to the website www.southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk.

This website is run by Broadland District Council and South Norfolk Council. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:

• change colours, contrast levels and fonts
• 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 (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)

We’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.

AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

How accessible this website is

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:

• most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
• some of our online forms are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard
• some pages contain heading tags with no text content
• some element IDs are not unique
• some scrollable elements are not keyboard accessible
• we have links to some of our systems operated by third party suppliers which are not fully accessible at this time

Feedback and contact information

If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:

• email: council@southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk
• freephone: 08003 896 109

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 10 working days.

If you cannot plan your journey using the google maps link on our ‘contact us’ page, call or email us for directions.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, you can contact our Web Services Lead by:

• email: council@southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk
• or select the 'website' option on our general enquiry form

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).

Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person

Information about contacting Broadland District Council or South Norfolk Council can be found on this page: Find out how to contact us.

Our office has audio induction loops in the council chamber as well as portable units for other areas.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

Broadland District Council and South Norfolk Council are committed to making their website accessible in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.

Non accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Microsoft Forms

As this is a product supplied by Microsoft, the non-compliances listed below cannot be fixed by the councils. The Microsoft accessibility conformance reports describe how their products support WCAG.

Customer Satisfaction Survey

The Customer Satisfaction Survey is partially compliant to WCAG 2.1 AA standards due to the non-compliances listed below. 

• There is no page title or heading structure which means navigation is impacted for assistive technology users. This fails criteria: 1.3.1 Info and Relationships and 2.4.6 Headings and Labels.
• A form label is present but doesn't have any content, which means information about this control won't be presented to the user. This fails WCAG criteria: 1.1.1 Non-text Content, 1.3.1 Info and Relationships, 2.4.6 Headings and Labels and 3.3.2 Labels or Instructions. 
• Two radio groups are within an empty container. This fails criteria: 1.3.1 Info and Relationships.
• One WAI-ARIA label copies the text content it is applied to, which means this could be read aloud twice to screen reader users.

Broadland missed bin form

The Broadland missed bin form is partially compliant to WCAG 2.1 AA standards due to the non-compliances listed below. 

• There is no page title or heading structure which means navigation is impacted for assistive technology users. This fails criteria: 1.3.1 Info and Relationships and 2.4.6 Headings and Labels.
• There are broken ARIA references which means that labels and descriptions won't be presented to assistive technology users. This fails criteria: 1.3.1 Info and Relationships and 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value.
• The alternative text function has been used on the logo but there is no alt tag in the code, which fails criteria: 1.1.1 Non-text Content and 1.3.1 Info and Relationships.

This Microsoft Form is in place whilst we develop a form in-house that will provide a better user experience for all customers. We have taken every step we can to make the form accessible but if you require this in an alternative format, please contact us by email wasteadmin.bdc@southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk

Assisted bin collection forms

The Assisted bin collection forms are partially compliant to WCAG 2.1 AA standards due to the non-compliances listed below. 

• A fieldset is missing which fails criteria: 1.1.1 Non-text Content, 1.3.1 Info and Relationships, 2.4.6 Headings and Labels and 3.3.2 Labels or Instructions. 
• There is no page title or heading structure which means navigation is impacted for assistive technology users. This fails criteria: 1.3.1 Info and Relationships and 2.4.6 Headings and Labels.
• There are broken ARIA references which means that labels and descriptions won't be presented to assistive technology users. This fails criteria: 1.3.1 Info and Relationships and 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value.
• A form label is present but doesn't have any content, which means information about this control won't be presented to the user. This fails WCAG criteria: 1.1.1 Non-text Content, 1.3.1 Info and Relationships, 2.4.6 Headings and Labels and 3.3.2 Labels or Instructions. 
• The alternative text function has been used on the logo but there is no alt tag in the code, which fails criteria: 1.1.1 Non-text Content and 1.3.1 Info and Relationships.

These forms have replaced the pre-populated emails that were linked on the Assisted collections page. These Microsoft Forms are in place whilst we develop a form in-house that will provide better user experience for all customers. We have taken every step we can to make the forms accessible but if you require this in an alternative format, please contact us:

• Broadland residents email wasteadmin.bdc@southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk
• South Norfolk residents email wasteadmin.snc@southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk

PDFs

Our garden waste bin collection calendars (PDF) have no tags, no alternative text, missing headings, irregular tables and missing table headers. This fails criteria: 1.1.1 Non-text Content, 1.3.1 Info and Relationships, 1.3.2 Meaningful Sequence, 2.4.3 Focus Order, 2.4.6 Headings and Labels, 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value. We will publish accessible garden waste calendars in March 2023 when the current calendars expire. In the meantime, customers can request the current calendar in an alternative format.

Some of our PDFs do not have document titles and are missing a language definition. This fails criteria: 2.4.2 Page Titled and 3.1.1 Language of Page. A list of PDFs with this missing information has been shared with our content editor team; the PDFs will be amended and updated on the website by 1 May 2023.

Some of our PDFs are not tagged and do not contain headings, which means content can’t be rendered in a meaningful way for assistive technology users. This fails criteria 1.3.1 Info and Relationships, 1.3.2 Meaningful Sequence, 2.4.3 Focus Order, 2.4.6 Headings and Labels, 4.1.1 Parsing and 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value. A list of PDFs with no tags has been shared with our content editor team; the PDFs will be amended and updated on the website by 1 May 2023.

My Area

My Area has some non-compliances which we are currently working to fix by 3 June 2023. This includes:

• A table element is present that doesn't use table header cells, which may be identified wrongly to screen reader users. This fails criteria 1.3.1 Info and Relationships and 1.3.2 Meaningful Sequence. 
• Some elements do not use ARIA attributes, which fails criterion 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value.
• Some interactive controls are nested which can cause problems for assitive technologies. This fails criterion 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value.

Course bookings

Bookwhen is partially compliant to WCAG 2.1 AA standards due to the non-compliances listed below. 

• Colour contrast is not sufficient on error messages, some buttons and links, and the 'Cost' table heading. This fails WCAG criterion 1.4.1 Use of Color.
• The date selection calendar cannot be navigated to when using a keyboard, which fails WCAG criterion 2.1.1 Keyboard.

We have provided Bookwhen with details of these non-compliances and they have agreed to fix these issues by six months' time. We will re-check the Bookwhen course bookings system in January 2024. If any course details are required in an alternative format, please contact us by email carrowbreck@southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk or phone 01603 788950.

Bookwhen has replaced the course bookings system, which was on the legacy 'Toplevel' product. The previous system was partially compliant with WCAG 2.1 AA standards but failed on nine areas across several different WCAG criteria. After conducting an accessibility check on Bookwhen, using a combination of manual and automated testing tools, Bookwhen is much more accessible and provides a far better user experience.

Disproportionate burden

PDFs and other documents

We have prioritised making accessible existing PDFs and other documents (eg in Word) published from January 2021 on www.southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk as well as making any new documents that we publish compliant. All documents (PDF, Word format etc) that are downloadable forms used for active administrative processes will be made compliant irrespective of their original publication date. We want to keep PDFs and other documents on the website for public transparency and will provide alternative versions upon request.

We have undertaken a detailed assessment and estimate in total for both councils (Broadland District Council and South Norfolk Council) that approximately 1,763 PDF documents remain non-compliant. It takes approximately 3 hours to review and make a document accessible. To fix the 1,763 documents that are within scope would take approximately 705 working days at a cost of approximately £72,660 in staff costs. The majority of these documents have not been viewed by a member of the public or have received very few views. However, we keep them on the website for public transparency and will provide alternative versions upon request. We believe that the cost of retrospectively fixing these documents would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the Accessibility Regulations 2018, ie, to fix all documents on www.southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk that have a publication date from 23 September 2018. Furthermore, we believe the benefit to the public in assigning staff or procuring external support to fix these documents would not be justifiable use of the public purse and users would instead benefit most from us focusing on fixing more recent most used documents and ensuring that new documents are accessible.

Village Clusters Housing Allocations Plan

We have taken all the steps we can towards WCAG 2.1 AA compliance for the PDFs relating to the development of the Village Clusters Housing Allocations Plan. The 'South Norfolk Level 2 SFRA Hydraulic Modelling Report' is partially compliant due to non-text elements missing alternate text on page one (the cover page). This fails criteria 1.1.1 Non-text Content and 1.3.1 Info and Relationships. As we have fixed what we can on this document, we believe any further time spent fixing the remaining issue will be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the Accessibility Regulations 2018.

Web forms, including front-end forms to third party systems

We’ve assessed the cost of fixing the issues with the electronic forms. We believe that fixing these issues would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. We have instead invested all our time and resources into building a new forms solution to meet all our accessibility needs for the future. We are actively redeveloping our forms into the new platform focusing on those forms which are most frequently used by our customers. For specific form non-compliances please see below.

Third party software and systems

Some online services we offer use software that is built and maintained by third party suppliers on our behalf. We have been working with suppliers to establish timescales and costs for compliance. The following outlines the current status of what has been done and what we believe would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations to fix at this time. We will make another assessment as supplier contracts come up for renewal. We are also reviewing systems as part of a corporate-wide programme of work to align IT systems across Broadland District Council and South Norfolk Council. 

Payment portal

We’ve fixed the issues with interactive tools and transactions on our Payment Portal but there are some remaining issues around missing labels and headings, which we are addressing with our supplier. We are aware the Visa and Mastercard verification service used when processing payments remains non-compliant and we are working with our current software provider to understand how this can be addressed.

South Norfolk Council systems

• Planning Portal and Local Land Charges: The third party suppliers do not currently have an accessible version of the software. These systems are in the scope of our review on aligning IT systems across both councils
• Council Tax: The supplier has confirmed their version is compliant but our checks have found otherwise, possibly due to customisation for our site. We are investigating this currently.
• Leisure system: We’ve assessed the cost of fixing the issues with interactive tools and transactions on our Leisure system. We believe that fixing these issues would at this time be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations

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

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. For example, we do not plan to fix Joint Core Strategy (adopted 2011, amendments adopted 2014). However, we want to keep PDFs and other documents on the website for public transparency and will provide alternative versions upon request.

We are also not required by the regulations to fix documents provided by third-parties that are neither funded nor developed by, nor under the control of the Council. We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.

We are not required to fix third party content that’s under someone else’s control, if we did not pay for it or develop it ourselves. For example, social media ‘like’ buttons. On the My Account login page a form control has a title but no label, which may affect keyboard-only users. As this part of My Account was developed by Microsoft, this issue is exempt from the accessibility regulations.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

We have worked with our website supplier to ensure that templates used by web content editors are accessible and responsive.

We have trained web content editors on accessible content with bespoke training by AbilityNet and Hassell Inclusion in accessibility awareness and accessible document production for all staff across the council.

We have set up processes so that this website is continually tested.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 27 May 2021. It was last updated on 24 November 2023.

This website was last tested on 24 October 2022. The test was carried out by our Siteimprove automated process producing reports and content editor guidance. We use Siteimprove manual testing for satellite sites related to this digital service.

We use this approach in deciding on sample of pages to test where they have been highlighted as having accessibility issues through the automated monitoring and reporting on content accessibility.

We test:

• our main website platform, available at https://www.southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk
• our online forms systems at https://forms.southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk and https://secure.southnorfolkandbroadland.gov.uk (subdomain names provided for information only. These are not linked to on this page because it would cause an error unless linked to a specific form).