Accessibility statement for the Shared Services website

Hampshire County Council is committed to making this guidance accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

This accessibility statement applies to these guidance pages on extra.hants.gov.uk.

Shared Services (IBC) is hosted by Hampshire County Council on behalf of the Shared Services Partnership. We want as many people as possible to be able to use these guidance pages to support the use of self service. For information about the accessibility features available and how to make the website easier to use, visit our accessibility page.

Compliance status

The guidance pages are partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standard.

Non-accessible content

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Global template

The global header when logged in contains an empty heading element. This can cause confusion for screen readers users and makes the page structure less clear.

Links

The default font size means that links that are in close proximity may be difficult to interact with without risk of pressing other, nearby links. We are looking to increase the default font size across our website.

Navigation

Some of our guidance pages use image navigation across the top of the page to skip to a subsection on the page. If a second level of navigation is not defined, an empty list element remains in the code. Empty list elements have a role in determining the page structure for assistive technologies.

Page titles, headings and subheadings

Some pages use image navigation across the top of the page to skip to a subsection on the page. The navigation uses H3 headings for navigation labels, while the destination sections are marked up with H2 headings. This creates an illogical heading structure.

Web chat

Hampshire County Council uses a third party chat component for providing assistance through live chat or a chatbot.

  • The button to activate the webchat is an image of text that reads 'need help? chat now'. The programmatic name of this button is 'Live chat'. The two should match, or the graphic should be replaced with live text.
  • The link to the privacy policy, and placeholder text for 'enter your email address' do not have sufficient colour contrast.
  • After selecting the webchat button, you must tab backwards to reach the chat window. The chat window should automatically be the next item of focus.

We have notified the supplier of these issues. The supplier has been active in rolling out improvements to the webchat component.

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

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they are not essential to providing our services.

We are working to ensure that any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared in November 2021. It was last reviewed on 22 October 2026.

The guidance pages were last tested on 15 July 2026 against the WCAG 2.2 AA standard.

The testing was carried out through in-house code and quality reviews, and using accessibility monitoring software.

Feedback and contact information

What to do if you cannot access parts of this website

If you need information on this website in a different format, use the Live chat now button. Live chat is available 8:30am to 5:00pm Monday to Thursday, and 8:30am to 4:30pm on Friday.

You can call us on 0300 555 0223 and use our call back service to leave a message. We’ll consider your request and get back to you on the same day if your request is considered urgent.

You can raise an enquiry through Employee Self Service.

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).