Universal barriers to access

If a person wants to apply for a passport, or book a driving test, or file a tax return — they can only do this using a government service. This means that government services have to be inclusive — they have to work for everyone, however they need to use them.

In 2019, Central Data & Digital Office (CDDO) did some work on how we can make sure services are inclusive. They identified that “government teams often focus on certain approaches to certain types of inclusion/exclusion” (Carpenter 2019a). For example, service standard 5 — make sure everyone can use the service — specifically references making services accessible for people with disabilities, and helping people with low digital skills. We have a good understanding of these 2 areas and specific requirements for them as part of the service standard.

However, “when we over-focus on who is being excluded, we lose sight of why they’re being excluded, and how those reasons can apply to all users” (Carpenter 2019a).

Knowing that 1% of the users of a service have a permanent disability related to their hearing might mean we over-focus on ensuring our service is accessible for those users. This means we might forget about the users with a temporary disability related to their hearing, like an ear infection. Or the users with a situational disability related to their hearing, like being in a noisy environment.

The universal barriers approach means focusing on the barrier — in this case, an inability to hear, rather than the users. It “shifts conversations from ‘what is wrong with these users’ to ‘what is wrong with my proposed product or service and where does it put up unnecessary barriers for people?’” (Schauberger 2023).

So if my service included content that is only in audio format, that is the barrier preventing users from accessing it. If I add subtitles to my audio, and a transcript — I’ve now removed the barrier for all users, including those who may just have a preference for reading over listening — such as myself.

Universal barriers is a framework of 11 barrier types that captures all the reasons why any person might be excluded. These barriers are universal to all users, and include reasons for exclusion which might be experienced by vulnerable and protected groups.

The framework is a useful tool that teams can use in different ways, at different phases of the delivery cycle. I recently talked about how I’ve used the universal barriers framework as part of Services Week, and others shared their own experiences. It was interesting to see how people were adapting the framework to be specific to their own users and services.

It would be great to see more teams adopting the framework and considering universal barriers as they design and build services. I’d also like to see recognition that teams need to address universal barriers as part of the Service Standard.

References

Carpenter, B. (2019a) Universal barriers to inclusion — what they are and how to address them.

Carpetner, B. ( 2019b) Understanding all the barriers service users might face, Government Digital Service blog.

Schauberger, U. (2023) Universal barriers to access.