Making our website more accessible
Our Rail business, alongside the wider NRL Group, are delighted to have recently launched a new accessibility tool to make navigating our website easier.
Understanding the need for accessibility
Scope, a registered charity that strives for equality for people with disability, have identified that there are more than 4.7 million people with disability working in the UK. Whilst a UK Government survey counted 14.6 million people living with some form of disability in the UK.
When we turn our focus to autism, the National Autistic Society highlights that one in 100 people are on the autistic spectrum, with around 700,000 adults and children diagnosed with autism in the UK.
Partnering with AccessiBe
Keen to ensure our website is as accessible as possible to every visitor, we were delighted to sign up to use AccessiBe’s online tool.
AccessiBe work with over 8,868 partners across the globe, to help make almost 145,000 websites more accessible – and we’re delighted to say that our website is included in this growing list.
The tool provides individuals with the power to make their own adjustments to how the website is displayed.
Using the website accessibility tool
You’ll see the tool in the bottom right corner, indicated by the blue circle icon. Click on this to explore the tool and see what visual changes you can make to the site to make the information easier to read through and digest.
When you launch the tool, you’ll see a range of pre-set profiles, as well as some handy adjustment tools to make it easier to read through the site.
Seizure Safe Profile
Websites can often contain lots of moving parts, designed to grab the attention of visitors. We fully appreciate though that this added movement can be difficult for some people, so the seizure safe profile will eliminate flashing or blinking images on website pages and reduce colour brightness.
Vision Impaired Profile
This profile will help anyone with visual impairments such as Glaucoma, Tunnel Vision and Cataracts, by making adjustments to the colour, font and size of information on our webpages to make it more accessible.
Cognitive Disability Profile
Designed to support people who have been diagnosed with Dyslexia, Autism or CVA, this profile highlights the key areas of the site to assist with reading and focus. Headings and buttons will be displayed in boxes so it’s clearer to see the key items on the page.
ADHD Friendly Profile
This profile can be used to reduce distractions on the website and help make it easier to focus throughout the site. This includes a reading mask bar which highlights the section of the page the user scrolls over, whilst adding a darker filter over the remaining page. This setting is best used on a desktop computer or laptop to benefit from all of its support features.
Blind Users Profile
To ensure each webpage is compatible with screen-reader technology, this profile can be selected. Make sure you have a screen-reader technology system installed on your desktop computer, laptop or mobile to use this feature.
Keyboard Navigation Profile
For visitors that are motor-impaired, this profile ensures that keyboard functions can be used across the website, to navigate through page by using the tab, shift and enter keys.