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Forget guidelines talk to users

Accessible and usable websites are a high priority within the public sector, yet within the private sector many feel overwhelmed by all the guidelines. Organisations should stop worrying about official recommendations and simply start talking to disabled users, argues Stefan Haselwimmer

Accessible and usable websites are a high priority within the public sector, yet within the private sector many feel overwhelmed by all the guidelines. Organisations should stop worrying about official recommendations and simply start talking to disabled users, argues Stefan Haselwimmer.

Several months ago I was talking to a web design agency about accessibility. They had a mixture of public and private sector clients and were interested in using the Usability Exchange to carry out accessibility testing of their public sector clients' websites. We had a number of discussions with them and were confident of moving things forward. Then one afternoon they rang with some news:

"Due to strategic priorities," they said, "we will be focusing on our private sector clients for the foreseeable future."

Little demand
Fair enough, I thought, different priorities. They seemed committed to web accessibility and I assumed they would be interested in using us for their private sector clients. But then they said, "There's very little demand for web accessibility from our private sector clients. It is unlikely we will be using you any time soon."

I was shocked... did they really see a sharp distinction between the public and private sector when it came to accessibility? Was it still so hard to sell accessibility to commercial organisations?

Speaking to other companies I have started to realise that, outside of the public and charitable sectors, web accessibility is still something of an optional extra, nice to have but not essential. Commercial websites offering such things as home shopping, social networking and job listings can transform the quality of life of disabled people so it's important to understand why commercial websites are so behind when it comes to accessibility.

Public sector is more advanced
I have a simple theory that might explain why: when it comes to web accessibility, the public sector is more advanced than the private sector because the public sector is more aware of disabled people. Local authorities, for example, provide services specifically for disabled people and so interact with these users on a regular basis. A large number of disabled people are also employed by local and central government. For public sector web managers web accessibility is not a theoretical concept based on a set of technical standards, it is about making websites work for disabled people, whether they are fellow employees or external clients.

This may also explain why large companies with a large number of disabled employees are often very progressive when it comes to website accessibility. But with smaller companies, there is less exposure to the views and experiences of disabled people and website accessibility becomes an abstract, often technical concept. In addition, corporate web managers interested in web accessibility end up arguing for "WAI Priority II compliance", which can be difficult for a non-technical audience to get to grips with.

Technical approach counter-productive
In many cases the technical approach to web accessibility, in terms of compliance with the accessibility guidelines, will be counter-productive. Any failure to comply with the guidelines is considered equally bad, regardless of its impact on disabled users. There appears little incentive to improve website accessibility unless full compliance is the goal; web managers feel compelled to hire accessibility experts to achieve this, due to the complexity of the guidelines. Web accessibility turns into such an expensive and time-consuming goal that it is put on hold indefinitely.

Engage with disabled users directly
In contrast to this negative attitude to web accessibility I would like to suggest a more positive and pragmatic approach. It comes down to this: engage with disabled people more. Find out what disabled people think of your website - it will often be a better guide to the accessibility of your website than automated accessibility checks. It may turn out that there are only minor accessibility problems with your website that are easy to fix.

If you do come across major problems while testing your website with disabled users, you will at least have compelling evidence there is a problem that needs to be addressed. The moral or legal arguments for web accessibility - that inaccessible websites discriminate against disabled people - become particularly vivid when disabled users say they can't use your website.

It is also important that you have some form of regular interaction with disabled people. It will ensure that web accessibility is constantly on the radar and that accessibility issues are addressed on an ongoing basis, rather than being allowed to build up. A good way to get this interaction started is to encourage disabled users to report accessibility or usability problems on your website as soon as they occur. If you have systems in place for addressing these problems promptly, you should soon see an increase in positive feedback from disabled users.

Finally don't be intimidated by the wealth of technical accessibility guidelines. They are only a guide and should be taken in context. At the end of the day what matters to disabled users is whether they can use your website - so talk to them, find out where they are experiencing problems and do your best to help them.

About the author
Stefan Haselwimmer is Managing Director of the Usability Exchange, a new website designed to help companies test their websites with a range of disabled users.