Disabled access and facilities in business premises

How to improve access for people with disabilities

Guide

Your business will have established a way of providing a service to your customers. This involves establishing:

practices - what your business actually does
policies - how your business regulates what it does
procedures - the systems set up to ensure the policies are achieved

Formal and informal practices on access

Practices, policies, and procedures may be:

set out formally, eg a ban on animals entering the premises
established informally or by custom, eg owners are discouraged from entering the premises with an animal but there is no outright ban or penalty for non-compliance

Accessibility audit

It is good practice to carry out an accessibility audit of your business. This will identify areas where you could make it easier for disabled people to access your business and its services. The Equality Commission provides an accessible business checklist (PDF, 581K) as part of their every customer counts initiative to help businesses assess and improve their accessibility.

Understand your customers

Good business involves anticipating what your customers need and want including the needs of disabled customers. Talk to your customers about the issues they may have when using your services, such as parking, getting in and out of your premises or using the facilities. Ask them for recommendations on how you could improve accessibility.

It is a good idea to think about the range of impairments that your customers may have, such as:

mobility impairments eg stick users or wheelchair users
visual impairments
hearing impairments
arthritis and limited dexterity
mental health
learning difficulties
learning disabilities

This will give you a better understanding of potential barriers to access for some of your customers. This enables you to take steps to remove these barriers.

Making reasonable adjustments for disabled access

Your business may have in place certain practices, policies and procedures which may place people with a disability at a disadvantage compared to non-disabled people in accessing your goods or services. You must make reasonable adjustments that let you provide a service that is as close as possible to the standard of service provided to other people. You must not wait until a disabled person wants to use a service before making any reasonable adjustments.

You must consider the need for, and put in place, any reasonable adjustments required by customers with a disability.

You can do this by:

removing the practice, policy or procedure altogether
making exceptions to the practice, policy or procedure to accommodate disabled people
informing, instructing, and training all employees so that they are aware of these changes

Examples of changing practices to improve disability access

Examples of changing practices, policies, and procedures include:

waiving a 'no dogs' policy to allow disabled people accompanied by an assistance dog to enter your premises
allowing other forms of identification other than a driving licence - thereby allowing disabled people who are not permitted to hold a driving licence to access your goods or services