RCGP digital accessibility statement

This website is run by the Royal College of General Practitioners. 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 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’re also making the website text easy to understand.

How accessible is this website?

On our website governance platform, Silktide, currently gives us a score of 94% on website accessibility. However, we know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:

• most of our PDFs are not fully accessible
• some forms do not have appropriate labelling
• you need to scroll horizontally when looking at some content on a small screen

See further, technical information about this site's accessibility.

How we’re improving accessibility

Our Digital Accessibility Working Group has established a roadmap of continuous improvement for digital accessibility at RCGP. The working group's responsibilities include:

• raising awareness and promoting culture of accessibility in the RCGP
• making recommendations for improving digital accessibility, and making sure these are done where possible
• gathering data and information around the accessibility experiences of members and staff
• offering support to members and staff who need accessibility expertise

In addition, we do automated accessibility testing twice a week. This helps us to understand what issues there are and how to fix them. It also ensures we can stay on top of any new issues that arise. 

We are also improving accessibility by:  

• making content easier to read and navigate
• rolling out an accessible PDF template
• working on template-level fixes with developers

Tell us about an accessibility problem

We are always looking for ways to improve the website. Please contact us to report an accessibility problem that isn’t listed on this page.

You can also request website content in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille.

Email: accessibility@rcgp.org.uk

Phone: 020 3188 7573

We’ll respond to your request within three working days.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

To help us make using the RCGP website a positive experience for everyone, we've been using the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1. These guidelines explain how to make web content more accessible for people with disabilities, and user friendly for everyone.

The guidelines have three levels of accessibility (A, AA and AAA). We’ve chosen Level AA as the target for RCGP's website and other digital platforms.

Website navigation and readability

• Ensure links are distinguished by more than just colour. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.4.1.

Mobile design

• On small phones, some content scrolls horizontally. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.4.10.

Forms

• All form controls and dialogs need labels. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.1.
• Form fields must identify what their purpose is programmatically to allow browsers to autocomplete known information. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.5.
• Some forms don’t have a submit button which can prevent people who use assistive technologies from submitting the form. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 3.2.2.

PDFs

• Some PDFs need to be made machine readable. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1.
• Many PDFs need to be tagged, have the correct heading structure and clearly defined titles. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.1 and 2.4.2. 
• Some long PDFs need to include bookmarks. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.4.5.

Member portal accessibility information

The member portal is where members can manage aspects of their membership, such as renewals. We know some parts of the portal are not fully accessible:

• ARIA IDs are not unique.
• The HTML language attribute has not been set.
• Background and foreground colours do not always have a sufficient contrast ratio, such as on some form labels.
• Focused elements are often difficult to see or invisible.
• There is no option to skip to content.
• Incorrect use of headers, including multiple H1s, skipped levels, and H4s in the footer.
• Not all images have meaningful alt text.

Fellowship application form

• There are defunct "Skip to content" and "Skip to navigation" buttons, which don't apply as there is no menu navigation.
• Incorrect use of headers, including no H1 and blank H2s.
• The font size is quite small, meaning the form is difficult to use on a mobile form.
• At the current font size, the light blue and white text and background combinations do not pass colour contrast checks.

As the RCGP member portal and Fellowship application form are built on Salesforce, you may find further useful information in Salesforce's Product Accessibility Status statement.

Third party content

We may sometimes have third party content or functionality on our website. Where we are required to feature third party content, we cannot reasonably accept responsibility for ensuring it meets accessibility standards. However, for all content we have control over or have otherwise chosen to include, we are committed to working towards ensuring this content is accessible as possible.

Third party platforms

We often use other applications to create content. For example:

• social media content, such as on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn
• videos which we post on YouTube or Vimeo

Where resource allows, we do our best to make this content as accessible as possible (for example, by making sure any video we upload to YouTube has appropriate subtitled, captions and audio description). However, we do not have influence over the accessibility of the platform itself (for example, the YouTube video player functionality).

Third party accessibility statements

We are committed to working with suppliers who prioritise and advocate for digital accessibility in their products and practices.

Here, we are listing statements from our suppliers which explain how their work complies with digital accessibility best practice, and the steps they are making to improve in this area. We will continue to add statements as we receive them from suppliers.

Help adjusting your device or browser

AbilityNet shows ways you can make your device and browser easier to use. It covers how to:

• use your keyboard instead of a mouse
• talk to your device or make it talk to you
• make text larger
• change your colours

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on 23 September 2020. It was last reviewed on 4 April 2024.