smallbusiness.co.uk: Helping your business think big

Most businesses are aware of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA), which aims to stop discrimination faced by disabled people in accessing a company's goods or services, but many don't realise that accessibility also applies to their websites.

As well as complying with accessibility guidelines, making your site available to everyone opens up possibilities of trade with the UK's disabled consumers who spend £45-to-£55 billion a year on goods and services. So says Dean Russell, of iConcertina Creative, who is on the British Standards Institute review board creating the website accessibility standard.

The DDA includes a code of practice stating that websites must be compliant. The imminent British Standard will give a definitive point of reference and will be used in courts of law should a dispute arise. Failure to ensure that a website has inclusive access could result in a claim from a disabled person who has not been able to use the site. The forthcoming British Standard review board's Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 'Guide to good practice in designing accessible websites' will help with this.

The standard, which is soon to be formalised, will require websites to incorporate specific features to comply. 'The term 'disabilities' covers all manner of individuals, not just the blind or partially sighted but also dyslexics or those with numeracy difficulties,' advises Russell. 'Furthermore, potential users should not be penalised simply because they are not 'web savvy' or have slow connections which means missing out on the full impact and functionality of a site.

'Consider common sense measures like increasing the font size, changing the typeface or colour of the background,' he continues. 'Blind people need screen readers yet some partially sighted require a text magnification function.'

Other things worth considering are:

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