The Disability Discrimination Act 1995 places a legal responsibility on businesses and organisations to take action to make their services and premises accessible to disabled people. This means that service providers must do what they can to make sure that disabled people can access all their services without experiencing disability discrimination.
Having a User Access Consultation carried out on your premises involves a team of disabled people with different impairments and conditions visiting and commenting on the accessibility of your premises.
After the visit you receive an access report detailing any barriers and making recommendations for change, while also highlighting best practice.
We consider:
- Physical barriers that could affect wheelchair users, people with reduced mobility and visually impaired people
- Communication barriers that could affect people with hearing impairments, and
- Information barriers that could affect visually impaired people.
The findings and recommended action points can help you meet your legal obligations.
Each organisation is different, so we design the User Access Consultation around you. We have experience of surveying a diverse range of venues including police and fire stations and football grounds.
We can concentrate on areas that the public access – this is the area in which the Disability Discrimination Act requires you to anticipate potential barriers that could be experienced by disabled people accessing your services. Or we can look at the staff areas of your buildings too. This will help you plan improvements for potential future disabled employees - whatever is best for you.
This is what Clare Fraser, Equality and Diversity Adviser at Clydebank College said of the service after we visited the College's new premises in February 2008:
"The visit itself was a very enjoyable and enlightening experience. Elspeth and her team were very positive and upbeat, and their suggestions were very practical. The report which was subsequently produced was extremely useful, and the College has implemented the changes suggested, and incorporated Capability Scotland's ideas into the College's Disability Equality Scheme."