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Accessibility

This accessibility statement applies to Welsh Ambulance Services University NHS Trust website.

This website is run by the Welsh Ambulance Services University NHS Trust. We want this website to be as accessible and inclusive as possible. For example, that means you should be able to:

  • 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’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.

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

How accessible this website is

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

  1. Some pages contain text that has poor colour contrast 
  2. Some pages contain headings that are not logically ordered
  3. Some pages are not fully usable with the keyboard
  4. Some pages have an illogical focus order

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:

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in the shortest possible timeframe.

Reporting accessibility problems with this website

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact: WAS.Communications@wales.nhs.uk and use ‘FOA the website manager’ as the subject line to ensure it is redirected to the correct department.

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 visit us in person

We provide a text relay service for people who are D/deaf, hearing impaired or have a speech impediment.

Our offices have audio induction loops, or if you contact us before your visit, we can arrange a British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter.

Find out how to contact us.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

The Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No.2) Accessibility Regulations 2018. 

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard. The ‘non-compliances and exemptions’ are listed below.

Non-accessible content

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

  1. Headings on some pages are not in a logical nested order. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.1 Info and Relationships Level A
  2. Some elements have an illogical focus order.  This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.4.3 Focus Order Level A

Disproportionate burden

Whilst we will prioritise patient information to ensure it is digitally accessible wherever possible, we know there are some sections of our website of a corporate nature, which are not currently accessible and have been produced since September 2018.

For these sections, we will identify where we know documents are non-compliant and provide contact details wherever possible.  As documentation is renewed in the future, we will ensure digital accessibility is considered Currently, these sections are listed as below: (and subject to change).

  • Board or committee papers
  • Performance reports which may contain complex reporting/ statistical data
  • Policies and procedures produced since September 2018
  • Publications linked from our Freedom of Information pages – including disclosure logs
  • Publications which may have been professionally produced since September 2018 which would have to be fixed by a third party. 

We’ve assessed the cost of fixing the issues listed above, and with interactive tools and transactions. We believe that doing so now would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations.

Navigation and accessing information

  • There’s no way to skip the repeated content in the page header (for example, a ‘skip to main content’ option).
  • It’s not always possible to change the device orientation from horizontal to vertical without making it more difficult to view the content.
  • It’s not possible for users to change text size without some of the content overlapping.
  • Interactive tools and transactions

Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations

PDFs and other documents

Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. By April 2024, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. For example, we do not plan to fix Trust Board and Committee Papers.

We will endeavour to make any new PDFs or Word documents we publish meet accessibility standards.

Video

We do not plan to add captions to live audio or video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.  However, we will always provide the option to switch on subtitles (embedding videos from Youtube plug-in) of pre-recorded videos produced.

What we are doing to improve accessibility

We currently do not have an accessibility roadmap, which shows how and when we plan to improve accessibility on this website, however we plan to have a roadmap by December 2024.

As a small Digital Communications Team, we aim to audit existing webpages on the website to remove or update content (PDFs, images, documents, videos) that does not comply with accessibility by April 2025.

Headings

We plan to review the format of all webpages and content by April 2025 to ensure that the content on all webpages where possible is accessible.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was updated on 28 October 2024. It will be reviewed and updated in April 2025.

 

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