Accessibility statement

This website is run by Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service. 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’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:

• most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software on fire.authority.dsfire.gov.uk
• British Sign Language (BSL) is not currently available
• not all our videos have sound
• some of the financial documents are hard to understand

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:

• email comments@dsfire.gov.uk
• call 01392 872200

We’ll consider your request and get back to you within five working days.

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 email comments@dsfire.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 or visiting us in person

We provide a text relay service for people who are D/deaf, hearing impaired or have a speech impediment in an emergency.

BT provide Relay UK, a service that connects people using a textphone with people using a telephone or another textphone. It allows deaf, hard of hearing and speech-impaired people to contact the UK 999 service in an emergency by dialling 18000.

Visiting us in person

Some of our offices have audio induction loops, or if you contact us before your visit we can arrange a British Sign Language (BSL) interpreter.

Find out how to contact us.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

Non-accessible content

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

British Sign Language content is not currently available 
We are looking into options for making British Sign Language content available on the website. We aim to resolve this by August 2023.

Video content is missing audio description and voiceover
Some of the videos embedded on the site do not have a voiceover. We have added transcripts for videos on our site. 
We will ensure all future videos embedded on the site have a voiceover. 

Longer documents such as financial reports can be difficult to understand due to the layout of the content
We will provide a summary of longer reports such as financial reports on an HTML webpage. We aim to resolve this by August 2023.

Language selector (footer)
The language selector is changed by browsing options not via a confirm choice button. This is an external add-on and it isn't possible to change how this feature works.

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

PDFs and other documents

Some documents are not accessible in several ways including missing text alternatives and missing document structure. For example, they may not be structured so they’re accessible to a screen reader. This fails Guideline 4.1 Compatible / Success Criterion 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value. These documents are not essential to providing our services.

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018.

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.

Live video

We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

Some PDF documents published on fireauthority.dsfire.gov.uk are not currently accessible. We are making every effort to publish accessible documents wherever possible. We are continually improving the training of our staff in publishing accessible documents.

Some of our financial documents are not accessible to screen readers. We are looking at alternative options to correct this for the next financial year.

Wherever we need to publish a PDF we will try to make an accessible version of the document available. If you need an accessible version of a document, please email comments@dsfire.gov.uk with your request.

How we tested this website

This statement was prepared on 14 September 2020. It was last reviewed on 10 October 2022.

This website was last tested on 12 January 2022. The test was carried out by Shelley Boden.

We used this approach to deciding on a sample of pages to test Website Accessibility Conformance Evaluation Methodology (WCAG-EM).