Accessibility

Accessibility Statement for the London Business Hub website

This accessibility statement applies to the whole http://www.businesshub.london domain.

This website is run by the Greater London Authority. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts
  • zoom in up to 400% without the text spilling off the screen and without content being truncated or overlapping
  • 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

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:

  • When using keyboard navigation, it can be difficult to see where the focus is in some browsers because the focus indicator does not have sufficient colour contrast. Some links do not have a focus indicator at all.
  • The dropdown menu at the top of each page is not keyboard accessible, so it is not possible to access the Logout link when logged in. The dropdown menu also contains a link to the Your Account page, but the home page contains a keyboard accessible link to that page.
  • Some pages such as Your Account contain buttons for selecting options. These are not accessible to people who use keyboard navigation.
  • The Add to Favourites buttons are not accessible to screen reader users.
  • Screen reader users cannot identify the buttons for closing some popup content. As a temporary workaround, refreshing the page will close the popup.
  • Several pages contain a facility for filtering the content by location, sector or needs. The filter is not accessible to people who use keyboard navigation, but this does not prevent them from accessing any content.
  • There is no “skip to content” link to allow people using keyboard navigation to bypass the links at the top of the page.
  • Many pages such as Favourites, Related Case Studies, Latest Posts and Related Articles contain “Read more” or “Keep reading” links whose purpose is ambiguous unless read in conjunction with the preceding paragraph.
  • The Discretionary Local Business Grants page contains a feature for finding information and links to each of the London borough schemes. This is inaccessible in a variety of ways, mostly affecting people who used screen readers or keyboard navigation. The feature is provided by Airtable so we cannot fix it ourselves, but we are in discussion with them to improve the accessibility.
  • There are several issues with the appointment booking feature on the Advisers pages including low colour contrast and lack of keyboard accessibility. The feature is provided by Calendly so we cannot fix it ourselves, but we are in discussion with them to improve the accessibility.
  • On the Commercial Insurance During COVID-19 page, people who use keyboard navigation cannot open the Notifiable diseases, Government ordered closure and Event coverage sections of the accordion in order to view the content in those sections.
  • The Quiz is not keyboard accessible.
  • Screen reader users cannot identify the social media links.
  • Some text has low colour contrast.

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:

  • call 020 7983 4100 (Monday to Friday, 9am – 5pm)
  • get in touch via our online form

We will consider your request and get back to you within five working days, to advise further.

If you cannot view the maps on our Advisers pages, call or email us for directions.

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, please contact our Digital Team by emailing digital@london.gov.uk.

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

Call 020 7983 4100 (Monday to Friday, 9am – 5pm) or get in touch via our online form.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

London Business Hub 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, due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.

Non-accessible content

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

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

  • When using keyboard navigation, it can be difficult to see where the focus is in some browsers because the focus indicator does not have sufficient colour contrast. Some links do not have a focus indicator at all. (WCAG criteria 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation and 2.4.7 – focus visible). We plan to add visible focus indicators to all focusable elements by mid-December 2020.
  • The dropdown menu at the top of each page is not keyboard accessible, so it is not possible to access the Logout link when logged in. (WCAG criterion 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation). We plan to make all links and buttons keyboard accessible by mid-December 2020.
  • Some pages such as Your Account contain buttons for selecting options. These are not accessible to people who use keyboard navigation. (WCAG criterion 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation). We plan to make all links and buttons keyboard accessible by mid-December 2020.
  • The Add to Favourites buttons are not accessible to screen reader users. (WCAG criteria 1.3.1 – information and relationships, 3.3.2 – labels or instructions, 4.1.2 – name, role and value, 1.4.13 – content on hover or focus). We plan to redesign the buttons to be accessible by mid-December 2020.
  • Screen reader users cannot identify the buttons for closing some popup content. (WCAG criteria 1.1.1 – non-text content, 1.3.1 – information and relationships, 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation, 4.1.2 – name, role and value). We plan to add text labels to all unlabelled buttons by mid-December 2020.
  • Several pages contain a facility for filtering the content by location, sector or needs. The filter is not accessible to people who use keyboard navigation, but this does not prevent them from accessing any content. (WCAG criteria 1.3.1 – information and relationships, 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation). We plan to make the buttons keyboard accessible by mid-December 2020.
  • There is no “skip to content” link to allow people using keyboard navigation to bypass the links at the top of the page. (WCAG criterion 2.4.1 – bypass blocks). We plan to add a “skip to content” link on every page by mid-December 2020.
  • Many pages such as Favourites, Related Case Studies, Latest Posts and Related Articles contain “Read more” or “Keep reading” links whose purpose is ambiguous unless read in conjunction with the preceding paragraph. (WCAG criterion 2.4.4 – link purpose in context). We plan to add hidden text to each link to provide additional context by mid-December 2020.
  • The Discretionary Local Business Grants page contains a feature for finding information and links to each of the London borough schemes. This is inaccessible in a variety of ways. (WCAG criteria 1.1.1 – non-text content, 1.3.2 – meaningful sequence, 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation, 2.4.3 – focus order, 2.4.4 – link purpose in context, 1.4.3 – colour contrast, 1.4.4 – resize text, 2.4.7 – focus visible). The feature is provided by Airtable so we cannot fix it ourselves, but we are in discussion with them to improve the accessibility. We do not have a timetable for this.
  • There are several issues with the appointment booking feature on the Advisers pages including low colour contrast and lack of keyboard accessibility. (WCAG criteria 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation, 2.4.3 – focus order). The feature is provided by Calendly so we cannot fix it ourselves, but we are in discussion with them to improve the accessibility. We do not have a timetable for this.
  • On the Commercial Insurance During COVID-19 page, people who use keyboard navigation cannot open the Notifiable diseases, Government ordered closure and Event coverage sections of the accordion in order to view the content in those sections. (WCAG criterion 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation). We plan to implement a fully accessible accordion design by mid-December 2020.
  • The Quiz is not keyboard accessible. (WCAG criteria 2.1.1 – keyboard navigation, 4.1.2 – name, role and value). We plan to implement a fully accessible Quiz design by mid-December 2020.
  • Screen reader users cannot identify the social media links. (WCAG criterion 1.1.1 – non-text content). We plan to redesign the hidden text labels by mid-December 2020.
  • Some text has low colour contrast. (WCAG criterion 1.4.3 – colour contrast). We plan to change all low-contrast text to have a contrast ratio in excess of 4.5:1 by mid-December 2020.

Disproportionate burden

We do not currently plan to make use of the disproportionate burden exemption. However, it may be necessary to do so if the suppliers of inaccessible third-party content are unable to address the issues we have reported to them and we are unable to find suitable alternatives.

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

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix the issues with the Google maps on the Advisers pages because they are not intended for navigation purposes.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

Comprehensive accessibility testing was conducted on the website before it was published on 24 September 2020. The timescale did not allow us to fix all the issues before launch, but some were fixed, and the rest have been put in the backlog and are being addressed as rapidly as possible. We expect to fix all the issues by mid-December 2020.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 24 September 2020.

This website was last tested between 14 and 20 September 2020. The test was carried out by Test Partners Ltd.

We used this approach to deciding on a sample of pages to test:

  1. An automated website mapping tool was used to identify all the pages that can be accessed by an anonymous visitor.
  2. A manual inspection was conducted to identify all the additional pages that can be accessed during the registration process and when logged in.
  3. The pages were inspected visually to identify common components that would only need to be tested once, such as the header, footer, main menu and search and filtering features.
  4. For each page, we recorded all the types of content other than text and images, such as maps, accordions, forms, infinite scroll and embedded third-party content.
  5. We then identified the minimum representative subset of pages that includes all the page templates and component types.

We will provide a link to the final version of the accessibility test report when the fixing and testing is complete, which is planned for mid-December 2020.