Connect with vendors on auditing standards and norms

[dav-idc]

What

Timeline: Estimated from January 2023 to October 2023 Priority level: 5 – what makes it easier for service teams to do their jobs Category: Processes in the UK government

Potential tasks

• Create a feedback loop between ourselves and agencies which conduct accessibility audits
• Identify issues being raised in audits that affect the GOV.UK Design System

Epic lead

Not yet assigned

Why

When service teams hear that the GOV.UK Design System meets WCAG AA criteria, they expect that means that auditing tools and companies won't flag anything from the GOV.UK Design System or GOV.UK Frontend as a WCAG failure. However, sometimes based on research, we implement slightly differently from the norm, in order to increase accessibility.

Setting auditing standards and norms with vendors can help to address and resolve items that are repeatedly flagged in audits. That might include making changes to the design system, or making changes to the way audits are performed. This would save service teams time, effort and grief.

Who needs to work on this

Internal to team: accessibility specialist, tech leads

External to team: Accessibility Monitoring team

Who needs to review this

Unknown

Done when

• [ ] Thing to do

[dav-idc]

Ideas for what we could partner on with vendors:

• Connect on 'issues you've heard about across government'
• Feed back on stuff we're intentionally doing differently, and should be ignored in audits

[dav-idc]

What they get:

• reputation boost
• better audits for things that use GOV.UK Frontend
• time saved on audits
• influence over the design system

What we get:

• better audits for UK gov
• less bug reports for things that aren't bugs
• faster and more robust feedback or research from testers
• influence over vendor audit priorities

[mgifford]

Will you also be connecting to open source communities that are leveraged by the UK government?

[dav-idc]

@mgifford great question: our team specifically works with some standards and guidance bodies, but I'm not sure if we're actively or planning to work with any open-source communities. I'll pass the question by the team. 👍