Accessibility update: OBSI website

Ensuring that our services are available and accessible to consumers of all abilities is critical to OBSI’s mission. To ensure that we were meeting this standard, in the last quarter of 2019 we conducted an audit of our website focusing on compliance with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) and improvements that could help us deliver content effectively to all consumers. A number of recommendations were made, many of which we have completed in the first quarter of the year, including:

• Updating alternative text to describe relevant images to users who may be using a screen reader.
• Including tags in the search results on the Find Your Firm page, so that a firm’s contact information can be read in the appropriate order by assistive technology.
• Adding similar heading updates to our Case Studies page and to the menus that appear when hovering over the top items on our homepage.
• Making error messages in our forms clearer so that users know which fields they need to correct in order to submit the form.

In the next quarter we will be focusing on some structural changes to the website, including building on the newly added Case Data and Insights section. Users of our website will see that our Case Studies page is now available under this heading. Our case statistics that were previously only available in our newsletter are also now posted.

We look forward to continuing to improve OBSI.ca to better serve all its visitors.