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Management Consultants | Website Accessibility and Usability at TouchstoneRenard.com

The power of the web is in its universality. Access by everyone, regardless of disability, is an essential aspect. Tim Berners-Lee, W3C Director, inventor of the World Wide Web

TouchstoneRenard.com has made a commitment to explore and implement new methods to ensure its information is accessible to as many visitors visitors as possible, including audiences with visual, hearing, cognitive or motor impairments.

As a result, in this new, continually evolving website, we are exploring techniques that can help us meet key accessibility standards, including exploring the guidelines laid down at:

The Disability Discrimination Act

Under the UK Disability Discrimination Act 1995, any company who provides a service to the general public is legally obliged to make their information, including web-based information accessible to all customers.

During 1999, the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) came into force throughout the UK. Part III of the DDA refers to the provision of goods, facilities and services. Although not directly cited, websites fall into the category of services and therefore need to be accessible in order to comply with the Act.

The DDA Part III Code of Practice states:

2.2 : "The Act makes it unlawful for a service provider to discriminate against a disabled person by refusing to provide any service which it provides to members of the public."

4.7 : "From 1st October 1999 a service provider has to take reasonable steps to change a practice which makes it unreasonably difficult for disabled people to make use of its services."

More information is available at the: Disability Rights Commission (external link) website.

Working To Improve Our Website Accessibility and Usability

During the coming weeks and months, we are committed to reaching WCAG A, AA, and eventually AAA (the highest accessibility ranking) standards, for all key pages we make available.

Even if we reach our goals, occasionally, we may make some mistakes, however, Touchstone Renard is committed to addressing access errors promptly.

Touchstone Renard welcomes any feedback which may help us improve accessibility of this website.

An Overview of Some Accessibility and Usability Steps We Have Taken

To improve our website accessibility, this website now includes the following key features:

Drop-down menus: you can navigate around this site with a mouse or other pointing device using the drop-down menus.
Navigating this site using a keyboard or keyboard-compatible device: in addition to using a mouse or other pointing device, you can navigate this website using a keyboard or keyboard-compatible device. You can use the TAB and ENTER keys, plus any other/alternative keys that your browser may set aside for that purpose. When using the TAB key, our website code automatically detects keyboard use and so bypasses opening the drop-down menus.
Web browsers: TouchstoneRenard.com is optimised for use on a wide range of web browsers. Usually, the latest web browsers offer the best viewing experience. You can download the latest versions of Internet Explorer (external link), Netscape (external link) and FireFox (external link)
Sentences and paragraphs: to improve understanding, help reduce any potential eyestrain, we seek to:
- Consider ways to make our website topics easy to read and understand.
- Keep sentences and paragraphs short and to the point.
- Ensure that there is a space between each paragraph or heading.
- Use bullet points to break up more complex sentences.
General site layout: is achieved using a carefully considered design based on Cascading Style sheets (CSS) and tables where necessary. However, TouchstoneRenard.com is designed in such a way as to still present its information clearly even if a user turns off style sheets.
Consistency across pages: to help as you move around TouchstoneRenard.com, we have kept the design and layout of navigation links the same throughout the site pages. Also, to avoid causing problems for people who may use screen readers or those who may choose to resize the text, we do not use pictures of words in our site navigation menus. Navigation menus use pure accessible text instead.
Colours: we use colour combinations in the design of the website that provide good colour contrast.
Frames: we do not use frames since frames can present unnecessary additional difficulties to some types of web access device.
Text links: each text link is formatted to ensure that it can be seen easily; that its meaning is clear; and that the page to which it links is clearly indicated.
Resizing website text: by default, we use an easy-to-read, non-serif font type, size and colour to aid onscreen reading. TouchstoneRenard.com uses cascading style sheets that allow users to resize the text of the website in web browsers that include text resize commands. Some existing web browsers include a text resize command somewhere in the View menu.
Access Keys: we have deliberately avoiding using Access Keys since they may interfere with shortcut keys that are provided in adaptive technology browsers. In addition to using a mouse, all visitors can navigate the website using a keyboard or keyboard-compatible device.

Site map pages: a site map can help you find the information you want. A link to a sitemap index of TouchstoneRenard.com is available on the main site navigation bar at toward the top of every page, just below the TouchstoneRenard.com logo.
Alt tags for images: as recommended in the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) and the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB), we use an "alt" tag to provide an equivalent text description for each image. Information embedded in Alt tags help users who may listen to the content description of the website using a screen reader.
Breadcrumb site navigation: the centre top or main column on every page includes a "You Are Here ... " breadcrumb navigation trail, that enables a visitor to easily navigate around the current branch of TouchstoneRenard.com. You can also use the breadcrumb navigation trail to better determine where you are within the overall website structure.
Web forms: web form controls are labeled clearly and grouped properly.
Links to external websites: are usually formatted so that a new, second browser window displays when a user chooses the relevant link.
PDF files: some documents are available for download in the Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format (PDF). To view PDF documents, you will need a PDF reader. The most recent version of Adobe Acrobat Reader provides support for Accessibility screen readers. You can download Adobe Acrobat Reader (external link)

Adobe also provide an Accessibility page (external link) that explains how vision impaired users can configure Adobe Reader to work with the assistive technology.

Also, you can now open up PDF files in your Internet browser: more information
Earlier web browsers: TouchstoneRenard.com uses carefully crafted cascading style sheets to preserve a consistent look and feel across a range of web browsers and other types of website viewing devices.

However, some earlier web browsers such as Netscape v4.x and earlier, and Microsoft Internet Explorer v3.x and earlier, do not fully support cascading style sheets.

If you are viewing TouchstoneRenard.com using a version of these older, arguably flawed browsers, some website components may behave differently, unless you disable style sheets.

Usually, you can disable style sheets through your web browser settings. To avoid display problems, consider, upgrading to the latest web browser.

Downloading Files Without Printing

To download and save a file without viewing:

Right-click the mouse cursor on the relevant link.
Choose or click 'Save Target As'.

How To Convert PDF Documents To Text

A range of current screen readers can read documents that are in HTML or ASCII format.

The latest technology allows you to convert Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) documents that may be available online, to either HTML or ASCII text format.

At the time of writing, we can suggest two options:

Web-based forms submission tool: here, a user can first enter the URL or web address of the PDF into an electronic form. Then, choose the "Get This PDF Document as HTML" button. The relevant document is then converted "on-the-fly" to HTML format and immediately delivered to your web browser.

Convert your PDF using the web (external link)
E-mail submission tool: here, a user can send the URL or web address of the PDF using e-mail, to have the PDF converted to HTML or ASCII text format. Then, usually within minutes, the converted results are returned back to the sender in the body of a new e-mail message.

Convert your PDF using e-mail (external link)

Additional Related Links Also Under / About / Accessibility:

Some guidelines on changing your default web browser settings

Responding To Usage Difficulties

If you experience difficulty viewing a web page at TouchstoneRenard.com using assistive technology, to ensure that we can make the information you are seeking available to you, please:

Contact: enquiry@touchstonerenard.com or telephone: 01483 763123 (from outside the UK: + 44 (0)1483 763123).
Describe the nature of the accessibility problem you're experiencing.
Indicate the web address containing the accessibility problem you've found.
State the format in which you would prefer to receive the information you're seeking.
Provide your contact information.

Thank you for using TouchstoneRenard.com

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