Accessibility Statement

In an emergency

• In a medical emergency, call 999.
• For urgent NHS advice when it is not an emergency, call 111.
• Please do not use our online forms or our email inbox to tell us about something urgent. They are read during office hours only.
• If you are worried that an adult is being harmed or neglected, contact the adult safeguarding team at their local council. If someone is in immediate danger, call 999.

Why accessibility matters to a care provider

The law that applies to us

What we have built into this website

• A skip link. Press Tab as soon as a page loads and a "Skip to main content" link appears, so you do not have to tab through the whole menu on every page (public pages — the staff dashboard does not have this yet; see below).
• Proper page structure. Every public page has a header, a main area, a footer, one main heading, and named navigation regions, so a screen reader can jump straight to the part you want. Our staff dashboard uses the same structure apart from the gaps listed below.
• A focus outline you can see. Whatever you are on shows a thick coloured outline. On our pale pages this is clear; on the dark green footer and the dark staff menu it is not clear enough yet, and we have listed that below under "Where this website falls short".
• Real form labels. Every box on every form has a visible label joined to it in the code, and hints and error messages are joined to their box too.
• Required fields are stated, not implied. A required field says so in words for screen readers, not only with a red star, and optional fields say "(optional)".
• Helpful errors. If a form is rejected, we say how many problems there are, move you to the first one, and keep everything you already typed so you do not start again.
• No CAPTCHA. There is no puzzle, no distorted text, no "pick the traffic lights". Spam is handled invisibly instead, so nobody is locked out by a test of eyesight or memory. Our spam protection is invisible, which does mean that very occasionally a genuine message can be stopped without you knowing. If you send us something and hear nothing within 5 working days, please ring 0121 643 9808 — it will not have been ignored.
• No cookie pop-up. Nothing covers the page or asks you to make a choice before you can read it.
• Native questions and answers. The FAQ sections use the browser's own show-and-hide behaviour rather than our own scripts, so opening and closing them is handled by your browser and works the way you are used to.
• Menus you can close. Dropdown menus and the mobile menu open with the keyboard, close with Escape, and put you back where you started.
• Descriptions on images that carry meaning. Photographs used purely for decoration are hidden from screen readers so they are not read out as clutter; images that carry information have a written description.
• Images with fixed dimensions, so text does not jump around while a page loads.
• Text and background colours picked and checked for contrast. Our main text, button and link colours meet the AA standard, and the key ones have their measured ratio written into the code next to the colour.
• Colour is never the only clue. Errors, warnings and confirmations always say what has happened in words, and are announced to screen readers, so you never have to see a colour to understand the message. Form errors also carry a warning icon; we are adding icons to the remaining messages.
• Everything works without third-party scripts. Fonts are served from our own site, and editors cannot embed videos, maps or trackers into a page, so nothing loads that could break the page or slow it down.

Using this website with a keyboard

• Tab moves forward, Shift and Tab move back, Enter follows a link or presses a button.
• The first Tab on any page offers "Skip to main content".
• Escape closes the mobile menu, any open dropdown, and the dropdown lists on forms.
• The dropdown lists on our forms behave like normal ones: arrow keys move through the options, Home and End jump to the ends, typing a letter jumps to a matching option, Enter chooses.
• The mobile menu keeps your keyboard inside it while it is open and returns you to the menu button when you close it.

Using a screen reader, magnifier or voice control

Changing colours, text size and motion

• Zoom with Ctrl and + on Windows, or Command and + on a Mac. On a phone, use the display or text size setting.
• Change text size, colours or use a reading mode in your browser settings.
• AbilityNet publishes free step-by-step guides for every common device and disability at https://mcmw.abilitynet.org.uk
• Be aware that some of our page headings sit over photographs, and forcing your own colours may not change those headings. If a page becomes unreadable, please tell us and we will send you the text on its own.

Where this website falls short

• Headings over photographs. On the home page and several section pages, white headings sit over a photograph. The photograph can be changed by our staff at any time, and nothing checks that the text still stands out clearly enough against it. This is the most likely place on the site where text may be hard to read. It relates to WCAG criterion 1.4.3 Contrast (Minimum).
• The focus outline on dark backgrounds. The outline that shows where you are is a warm brown, which is clear on our pale pages but does not stand out enough against the dark green footer or the dark staff menu. If you are tabbing through the footer links you may lose track of where you are. This relates to WCAG criterion 1.4.11 Non-text Contrast.
• Our drop-down menus describe themselves wrongly to screen readers. The buttons that open the menus in the main navigation announce themselves as opening a menu, but what opens is an ordinary list of links. Arrow keys will not move through it — Tab does, and Escape closes it. A screen reader may therefore tell you to expect keys that do nothing.
• No support for forced colour modes. If you use Windows High Contrast or a similar contrast theme, some of the site's shading disappears, and a few things that are shown only by a faint background — such as which menu item you are on — may stop being visible. There is also no dark theme.
• Alternative text is not enforced. Our staff are asked to describe every image when they upload it, but the system does not currently insist on it or check the quality. An image could go live with a missing or unhelpful description. Some descriptions our staff write are also not used on the page, because our hero images are always treated as decorative in the page template, whatever an editor marks them as.
• Jumping to a section can leave it behind the header. The header stays at the top of the screen as you scroll. If you follow a link to a heading further down a page, that heading can end up hidden behind the header on some pages. This relates to WCAG criterion 2.4.11 Focus Not Obscured.
• Headings inside written content. Pages, articles and legal documents are written by our staff. Nothing checks that their headings run in a sensible order, so on some pages a screen reader's heading list may skip a level.
• No breadcrumb trail on screen. Deep pages do not show a visible trail back to where you came from, which removes a helpful orientation cue.
• One small button. The main call-to-action button in the site header is 36 pixels tall rather than the 44 pixels we use everywhere else. It meets the minimum WCAG 2.2 requires, but it is smaller than the rest of the site and harder to hit accurately.
• Our staff dashboard has its own gaps. It has no skip link, so a keyboard or switch user has to tab past around twenty menu items on every screen, and its date picker is built in a way some screen readers will not read correctly. This matters most to disabled employees and job applicants, and we are including it here rather than quietly leaving it out.

Content we do not control

• Our page on the Care Quality Commission website, linked as https://www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-340793978, is run by the CQC.
• Any other website we link out to, including the map link on our contact page.
• Any document, such as a PDF, that we link to but do not host ourselves. Our staff cannot attach files to a page — they can only link out to one — and we do not check documents held on other people's websites for reading order or screen-reader tagging.
• CVs and documents uploaded by job applicants, which are the applicant's own files.

What we have not tested

• No independent audit. Nobody outside Premium Community Care has assessed this website. We do not hold any accessibility certificate and are not claiming one.
• No screen reader testing. No session with NVDA, JAWS, VoiceOver, TalkBack, Dragon or a magnifier has been carried out or recorded.
• No testing with disabled people. We have not run a user panel or usability sessions.
• Our automated checks do not cover WCAG 2.2. They test against the earlier 2.0 and 2.1 criteria, so the six newer 2.2 requirements are not checked automatically, even though 2.2 is the standard we are aiming at.
• Our automated checks only fail on serious problems. Anything the tool rates as moderate or minor is currently allowed through, and results the tool is unsure about — which includes text over photographs — are set aside rather than reviewed.
• Only the resting state of each page is checked. Open menus, dropdown lists, confirmation dialogs, the date picker and forms showing errors are not covered by the automatic checks, and that is where the most complicated parts of the site live.
• One browser only. Testing has been done in Chrome on a desktop. Safari, Firefox and real mobile devices have not been tested.
• The checks are not automatic. A developer has to run them by hand, so a change could reach the live site without being checked.

How this website has been tested

• An automated accessibility scan of 18 public pages and 20 staff pages, using the axe testing tool against the WCAG 2.0 and 2.1 A and AA criteria. Serious and critical problems must be zero for the tests to pass.
• An automated check that five public pages still work at 320 pixels wide without sideways scrolling.
• An automated check on our home page that movement is switched off when a visitor has asked their device to reduce animation. The rule that does this is applied across the whole site, but only the home page is checked automatically.
• Automated keyboard checks on the dropdown menus, including opening, closing with Escape and returning focus.
• A manual review of keyboard operation, page structure and zoom.
• Contrast checks on the site's main colour palette. The ratio for our accent colour is recorded in the code; the remaining checks were done by hand and are not all written down yet. Recording the measured ratio next to every colour is on our list below.
• An earlier review found and fixed five problems, including raising the contrast of our main button colour and of the labels in the staff menu.

If you cannot use part of this website

• Ring 0121 643 9808 during Monday to Friday, 9am to 4pm and we will talk you through anything on this site, or take the details over the phone so you do not have to fill in a form.
• If you are Deaf or hard of hearing, you can reach us through Relay UK: dial 18001 followed by 0121 643 9808, using the Relay UK app or a textphone.
• Ask us to read a page to you over the phone, including this one.
• Ask for large print. We will post or email any page in a larger, clearer typeface.
• Ask for plain text or a simpler summary if long documents are hard to take in.
• Ask for easy read. If short sentences and pictures help, we will put the important points into an easy read version for you.
• Ask for a format we have not listed — braille, an audio recording, or an interpreter, including a British Sign Language interpreter. Tell us what you need and we will arrange what we reasonably can, and say so honestly if we cannot.
• Ask us to visit. If you are in our area we can bring printed information to your home and go through it with you.
• Nominate someone else. Tell us to speak to a family member, carer or advocate on your behalf and we will deal with them instead.
• Write to us at 86 Digbeth, Birmingham, B5 6DY if post suits you better than email.
• Applying for a job: our application form has a box for reasonable adjustments, and you can also email careers@premiumcommunitycare.com or call 0121 643 9808 to apply another way entirely.
• Making a referral: call 0121 643 9808 or email referrals@premiumcommunitycare.com instead of using the online form.
• If we already provide your care, tell your care coordinator what formats work for you. Information about your own care is handled through your care records, separately from this website.
• None of these routes is for emergencies. In a medical emergency call 999; for urgent NHS advice call 111.

Information about your own care, not just this website

• Tell us at your assessment, or at any time afterwards, how you would like to receive information about your care.
• We record your communication needs alongside your care records, so the staff who visit you know before they arrive.
• If your needs change, tell your care coordinator and we will change the record.
• You can ask us to send information to a named family member, carer or advocate as well as, or instead of, you.
• If you are already receiving care and something is being sent to you in a form you cannot use, ring 0121 643 9808 and we will put it right.

Reporting an accessibility problem

• Email info@premiumcommunitycare.com
• Call 0121 643 9808 during Monday to Friday, 9am to 4pm
• Write to Premium Community Care Ltd, 86 Digbeth, Birmingham, B5 6DY
• Use the contact form on our contact page, if you are able to
• If you use the form and do not hear back within 5 working days, please ring us instead.

What happens after you contact us

• We will acknowledge your message within 5 working days.
• If you have asked for information in another format, we will supply it within 10 working days, and sooner where we can.
• We will give you a full reply about the problem itself within 20 working days, telling you whether we can fix it, how, and roughly when.
• If you would rather make it a formal complaint straight away, our complaints process acknowledges more quickly: we aim to acknowledge a complaint within 3 working days.
• If we cannot fix something, we will say so honestly and offer another way to get what you need.
• We keep a record of accessibility problems reported to us and use them when we next review this statement.

If you are not happy with our response

• Equality Advisory and Support Service, freephone 0808 800 0082
• Textphone 0808 800 0084
• Website https://www.equalityadvisoryservice.com
• The Care Quality Commission is the right place for concerns about the quality or safety of the care we provide, but not for concerns about this website. Our CQC page is at https://www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-340793978
• The Information Commissioner's Office is the right place for concerns about how we handle your personal information. See our privacy policy.

Our position in full

What we are working on next

• Add the WCAG 2.2 criteria to our automated checks, so the standard we aim for is the standard we test against.
• Change our automated checks so that moderate problems and uncertain results are reported rather than passed over.
• Check the contrast of headings over photographs, and stop unsuitable images being published behind text.
• Record the measured contrast ratio next to every colour in the code, including the colours we use for errors, warnings and confirmations.
• Give the focus outline a version that stands out on the dark footer and the dark staff menu.
• Correct how our drop-down menus describe themselves to screen readers, so what is announced matches how they actually work.
• Add a warning icon to the remaining status and confirmation messages, so the words, the colour and the icon always agree.
• Add support for Windows High Contrast and other forced colour modes.
• Add a skip link to the staff dashboard and fix the date picker so screen readers read it correctly.
• Make alternative text a genuine requirement when an image is uploaded, and make sure the description our staff write is the one actually used on the page.
• Arrange proper testing with screen readers, and with disabled people rather than only about them.
• Run the accessibility checks automatically whenever the website is changed, so problems are caught before they go live.