Accessibility statement for Welcome to Sheffield

This accessibility statement applies to content published on www.welcometosheffield.co.uk

This website is run by Sheffield City Council's Marketing Sheffield Team. 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 continually reviewing our website text to make it 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: 

• some of our maps don’t have an accessible alternative
• some of the older documents added before 23 September 2018 may not be accessible. Documents added after this date are checked for accessibility issues using Adobe Acrobat Reader

Feedback and contact information

 If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF or large print:

• email stephen.bissell@sheffield.gov.uk

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 3 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, email stephen.bissell@sheffield.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).

Technical information about this website’s accessibility 

Sheffield City Council is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 AA standard, due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below.

Non-accessible content 

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

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations 

Menus

• At 200% zoom and more, the keyboard focus tabs through links within the hamburger menu whilst it is closed. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.7 Focus Visible
• At 200% zoom, once expanded, some of the dropdown menus within the hamburger menu cannot be expanded. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.11 Focus not obscured
• When hovering over the navigation bar dropdown menus, there is no mechanism to dismiss the additional content triggered without moving pointer hover or keyboard focus. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.13 Content on Hover or Focus
• In the language dropdown menu, li elements must be contained in a ul or ol. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 Info and Relationships

Cookies

• The keyboard focus is not visible on the buttons 'Accept all cookies' and 'Adjust cookie settings' within the cookie banner pop up as the page first loads. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.7 Focus Visible
• Both 'Show vendors within this category' buttons within the cookie banner once the keyboard tabs away from them. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.3 Contrast (minimum)
• The keyboard focus is not visible for 2 keyboard tabs when tabbing between the cookie icon in the bottom corner of the webpage and the 'Select language' dropdown menu. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.7 Focus Visible

Videos

• The page title 'Your next weekend away starts here, in Sheffield' on a background video. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.3 Contrast (minimum)

We aim to fix these issues by 31 December 2025.

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

PDFs and other documents  

Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. We will continue work to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.

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

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards. We are aware that assets we have added for use by community groups to help them share messages about Coronavirus may not be accessible. These have been sourced from Public Health England and are intended for print purposes only.

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 

We continue to develop our guidance for content editors on how to make the site content accessible. We have also embedded accessibility into our internal processes to ensure all future development has accessibility as part of its acceptance criteria.

We continue to raise awareness of accessibility and help develop training to support services across the organisation.

Preparation of this accessibility statement 

This statement was prepared on 27 August 2025. It was last reviewed on 27 August 2025.

This website was last tested on 27 August 2025. The test was carried out by Sheffield City Council's Marketing Sheffield team.

We tested our main content templates using a combination of automated and manual checks.