The PDF (portable document format) is a very popular format for documents from simple instructions, maps and diagrams, to complex forms. However, simply saving a document as a PDF can often lead to accessibility issues for the candidate and a PDF is not, by default, accessible. For this reason the documents an organisation has in PDF format are generally not accessible and for this reason you should not assume that the ones you send out to candidates are either.

There are helpful guides and tutorials on ensuring the accessibility of PDFs on the Adobe accessibility pages and we would strongly advise you to ensure that all your most commonly used PDF documents are checked for adherence to these accessibility guidelines. If it helps AbilityNet is able to help with the compliance checking of your PDFs – contact details below.

Where it is difficult or infeasible to make certain PDFs accessible it is important to provide those documents in an alternative format which is more accessible. A good format for accessibility is Microsoft Word – and where a document is already available in this format it might be worth sending that in preference to a PDF which, unless it has been checked and adjusted for accessibility compliance, may well be less accessible by default.

PDF Auditing Services

Please contact AbilityNet for more information on their services including PDF accessibility.