12 September 2006

Major international organisations have been criticised for not complying with accessibility guidelines.

A US study of 100 major international companies such as Intel, Microsoft and Johnson & Johnson, found that many were slow to comply with the standards.

The research was conducted by The Customer Respect Group, which claims that providing a high-quality website is "critical" to ensuring customer loyalty.

Organisations were tested on the usability of their websites, along with their "attitude" to accessibility.

Examples of this include 86 per cent of websites not providing text in strongly contrasting colours for navigation buttons.

Furthermore, 58 per cent of home pages did not feature one tag description for every image, which the company states is "one of the easiest accessibility aids to implement".

However, companies rated more highly for usability, with the top 100 companies scoring 6.6 out of ten in this area.

© Adfero Ltd

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