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Accessibility statement

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Accessibility statement for Peterborough.gov.uk

This accessibility statement applies to the Peterborough City Council website, www.peterborough.gov.uk. This website is delivered and maintained by Peterborough City Council. It is designed to be used by as many people as possible. The text should be clear and simple to understand. 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 aim to comply with WCAG 2.1 standards at AA standard. We also address AAA issues where possible. We aim to allow you to 'optimise your user experience'. Put simply, this allows you to view and use the Peterborough Council website the way you want to - not the default way. For information on how to optimise your browsing experience, by changing your operating system preferences and/or browser accessibility tools please visit:

My Computer My Way - Abilitynet.

Google, Chrome, Android - accessibility features and personalisation.

Microsoft, products, browsers and operating systems - accessibility features and personalisation

Feedback and contact information

If you need information in a different format, like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille, please contact us and tell us:

  • the web address (URL) of the page content
  • your name and email address
  • the format you need, for example, audio CD, braille, BSL or large print, accessible PDF

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems that are not listed on this page or you think we’re not meeting the accessibility requirements, please contact the web team.

Enforcement procedure

If you contact us with an accessibility complaint and you’re not happy with our response, or how we resolve the complaint you can contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS). 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’).

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

Peterborough City Council is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018. This regulation includes meeting WCAG 2.1 standards at AA standard.

Compliance status

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

We aim to meet WCAG 2.1 to AA standards, however as a constantly evolving website some content issues can arise from time to time. We monitor our website weekly using SiteImprove and will seek to address any issues within 4 weeks or list longer term issues on this page.

  • We had an average accessibility score of 95% (A to AA standard) for our website during 2023. The lowest recorded score was 93.6% and the highest was 95.9%.
  • We aim to exceed the industry standard in accessibility benchmark tests - this was an average of 87% for 2023.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Some pages need general improvements/maintenance where they where made live due to a fixed deadline - we aim to fix issues within four weeks. Site improve records when the issue was first identified.

The content that is not accessible is outlined below with details of:

  • where it fails the success criteria
  • planned dates for when issues will be fixed

The following A or AA level issues have exceeded the four week allowance:

  1. Some third-party applications/functions are not fully compliant which can impact on the complete user experience. Audit to take place late 2024. This will most likely be considered alongside a review of WCAG 2.2 requirements.

Third party systems

The council uses the systems listed below that are supplied by other organisations to provide access to services online through the council website. Some of these third party systems are not fully accessible. If you have a problem accessing any third party systems please contact us. 

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

  • Third party content that the council has not paid for or developed - for example, social media 'like' buttons
  • Live audio and video
  • Maps
  • Archives and historical information

How we tested this website

This website was and is currently being tested for compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines V2.1 level A and level AA, and these tests have been carried out internally. For the ongoing monitoring of accessibility issues with our web content we use SiteImprove. For detailed investigations and coding issues we use google dev tools and lighthouse, in consultation with our website developers.

What we're doing to improve accessibility

Accessibility improvements are carried out on a daily basis. We plan to identify and fix issues according to the timescales described. The majority of issues that can crop up are fixed as they are discovered. Any issues requiring investigation or known longer term fix will be recorded in the 'Non-accessible content' section above and the timescales indicated.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 23 September 2022.
Last reviewed July 2024.

This website is monitored on a monthly basis. Tests are carried out by our in-house web team. We use SiteImprove to monitor accessibility issues.

Accessible documents policy

This policy explains how accessible the documents on the council website are. It covers PDFs, spreadsheets, presentations and other types of document.

Using our documents

The council publishes documents in a range of formats, including PDFs and spreadsheets.

We want as many people as possible to be able to use those documents. For example, when we produce a document we make sure to:

  • provide an HTML alternative where possible to reduce our use of PDFs
  • tag headings and other parts of the document properly, so screen readers can understand the page structure
  • make sure we include alt text alongside non-decorative images, so people who cannot see them understand what they’re there for
  • avoid using tables, except when we’re presenting data
  • write in plain English

How accessible our documents are

Documents that we publish and documents you need to download or fill in to access our services should be fully accessible.

Although most of our documents pass accessibility checks to WCAG 2.1 - we know that in reality these may not be 'humanly accessible' - for example it might be a plan map of a new parking zone - or a technical diagram with alt text, but the complexity of the diagram may not be fully explained. We also know large PDFs, do not work well on small screens. We aim to include a contact number or alternative information these instances. 

After a large project to update over 1500 documents (including the ones pre-dating 2018) we managed to have all our PDFs meet accessibility standards. We now aim to maintain this with no document on the website failing a check after four weeks of upload. Typically, we will never have more than 3% of our PDF documents failing accessibility checks.

During 2024 and 2025 we will be exploring and gradually seeking to reduce the use of PDFs on our website, where possible we will seek to create HTML content, prioritising core service information.

If you need to access information in a PDF that has been uploaded, and it does not meet your needs, you can contact us and ask for an alternative format.

Reporting accessibility problems with one of our documents

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of our documents. If you find any problems not listed on this page or you think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements please contact the web team.

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).

Technical information about the accessibility of our documents

The council is committed to making our documents accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018. The documents the council publishes are partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

Making documents available in other languages

We do not provide documents translated into other languages on our website. If you would like to request a document in another language, please contact us and a translated version of a document may be provided where possible.

Non compliance with the accessibility regulations

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

A few of our documents have diagrams or maps. These images have a text alternative, but it may be impossible to fully detail what is visually being described, so the information in them is not available to people using a screen reader. This does not meet WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content).

Documents on this pavement licence page are submitted by the public and are made available immediately for 7 days as part of a wider consultation. Parts of the documents may contain hand drawn diagrams and hand-written information. Contact details are on the page to access this information in an alternative way. 

Documents on this school admissions page, are not our documents, and are supplied by the schools administering this process. They are a mix of document and forms, in word and PDF format and have a range of content tagging issues between then. For an alternative format the schools can be contacted directly. We are reviewing alternative options for the September 2024 admissions round.

Documents in our financial section can contain complex tables and data. You can contact us to ask for this information in an alternative format.

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

  • We have some third-party documents linked to from our website, these are often not part of our service delivery and often promotional materials, signposting and further information materials. We aim to hyperlink to 3rd party materials, and only host them where they are not available elsewhere.

Last reviewed July 2024.

Published: 28 October 2024