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Have you made sure Word structural elements and images are marked-up correctly?

  • Anna is blind and unable to fill in an important form by using a screen reader. As there is no alternative version, Anna has to ask a friend to visit and help.
  • Delphine is a Chief Executive and prefers to listen to information during the commute home. Delphine is unable to listen to content in Word because it hasn't been optimised for accessibility. Because the Word document is unable to be understood by the mobile phone reader, Delphine now has to work in the evening.
  • Ned is an electrician. Ned is unable to find important safety information as it's only available in Word format and is not showing up in a site search.

Steps to take

  1. Publishing content on a web page rather than in a Word document should be the default format for all government information.
  2. If this is not possible, or if you are publishing an alternative version of your web content in Word - read the Australian Government guide to Microsoft Word. The guide covers structuring and why you need to provide an alternative format.
  3. Watch Microsoft's Word accessibility training series.
  4. Learn to create and check for accessibility issues using supporting documentation from Microsoft.

Supporting resources

Next page: Accessible print publications

Page last updated: 22 June 2021