Accessibility policy

This accessibility policy applies to the Colchester City Council website located at new.colchester.gov.uk.

Colchester City Council is committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience, regardless of ability or technology.

Policy intention

The intention of this policy is to state clear accessibility principles that this website should follow.

We are in the process of ensuring its pages comply with the AA standard of the W3C version of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).

Web accessibility aims to make web text, images, forms and navigation accessible and understandable for everyone. For example, this 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)

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

How accessible is this website

This website, new.colchester.gov.uk, is compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard.

We will make reasonable adjustments to meet specific individual needs.

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: onlineteam@colchester.gov.uk

We will consider your request and get back to you in 5 days.

Non-accessible content

Through routine internal testing, we are able to identify any areas of the site with accessibility issues.

The accessibility problems that were identified with the web templates used on colchester.gov.uk have been resolved with the migration to the new website.

All web templates have been redesigned, rebuilt, and tested against accessibility compliance.

All content was moved to these accessible templates.

The layout, structure and text content of online forms are being reviewed and redesigned to make them accessible.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

WCAG 2.4.2 Page Titled

Some documents do not have a descriptive page title, meaning that users may have difficulty in finding and identifying the content. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.4.2 (Page Titled).

We are currently in the process of developing a solution to convert all of our PDF documents to web pages to ensure accessibility compliance. 

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

Colchester 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 website is compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard.

Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

Whilst we strive to adhere to the accepted guidelines and standards for accessibility and usability, it is not always possible to do so in all parts of the website.

PDFs and other documents published before 23 September 2018

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they are not essential to providing our services.

We provide further guidance describing which document types we publish and what users should be able to do with them.

Using our documents

Live video

We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.

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

If you are visiting us, we have induction loops in the following office locations:

Rowan House G3 Induction loop
Town Hall Council Chamber Induction loop
Town Hall Moot Hall Induction loop
Town Hall Grand Jury Room Infrared
Town Hall North Committee Room Infrared
Town Hall Mayors Parlour Infrared
Town Hall West Committee Room Infrared

Telephone translation services are available to staff and customers 24 hours a day, 365 days per year in over 200 different languages. Language Line Solutions Ltd is the chosen partner to provide our telephone translation services.

Preparation of this accessibility policy

This statement was prepared on 07 January 2020. It was last reviewed on 14 September 2026.

This website was last tested on 10 September 2026. The test was carried out internally at Colchester City Council by the Online Team.

The approach used to testing was:

  • We run an accessibility test that was custom built for this website that scans the entire website and it's code. 
  • We look at the generated report to see if there are any problems highlighted.
  • We fix those problems and run the test again to ensure it is fixed.

The full accessibility testing reports are available upon request. Requests can be made to onlineteam@colchester.gov.uk.