Accessibility

Marks & Spencer recognises the importance of providing a website that is accessible to all user groups, including the disabled, the visually impaired and those with motor deficiencies and cognitive disabilities.

This statement explains the accessibility features we have implemented to help you use this website. They help to improve navigation for screen readers, keyboard navigation and text-only browsers among other things.

Please let us know if you have any questions or feedback regarding the accessibility of this site or if you experience any difficulty using it. Alternatively you can call us on 0845 609 0200.

General information

We’ve designed this site with accessibility in mind. Some of the general features include:

• The use of clear, simple language which is easy to understand.
• The use of common web conventions.
• Avoiding the use of blinking or flickering elements.
• The use of validated HTML and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)

Standards Compliance

We have strived to ensure our website conforms to level A compliance as specified by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). In some cases the website provides enhanced features via JavaScript. Our goal is to provide equivalent functionality for users who are not able to use JavaScript and we are working hard to achieve this.

We use a number of tools to perform automated accessibility tests, but this is just one aspect of our testing procedure. Being automated, these tools are not as reliable as expert evaluation. Pages are also tested in a variety of screen reading applications.

Background, text and colour

Careful use of text colours, size and background colours can help people with a range of visual impairments. Here’s what we’ve done:

Colours

Our site is usable by anyone with colour deficient vision. We’ve checked the site’s font and background colour to ensure there are no combinations against the different colour blindness conditions and ensured that all information is still clear.

We’ve designed all pages on our website so that all information that is conveyed with colour is also available without colour.

Font and text size

While we’ve used clear, legible font for all text and headings. In the Firefox browser, select View, then Text Size, and then choose increase, or decrease.

Style sheets

This site uses cascading style sheets (CSS) for visual layout. Where possible, we’ve also made our website navigable, usable and readable if your browsing device does not support style sheets.

Non-text elements

Providing alternatives for non-text elements gives visually impaired and screen-reader users wider access to our website.

Images, videos and other non-text elements

We’ve made it possible to use our site without having to view graphics or images. All non-text elements, such as images, animations, symbols, audio, video and multimedia have text equivalents. We’ve done this by providing descriptive alt attributes for them. Purely decorative graphics or formatting images have empty alt attributes.

Scripts

Our website uses JavaScript to improve usability and the online shopping experience. To help you use the site, we’ve created alternative non-JavaScript pages for the most critical pages.

Links and navigation

Structuring a website so it is simple and streamlined to use helps to improve the experience for all. For example, placing page items in a logical order and making the website easy to navigate helps people with visual impairments, motor deficiencies and cognitive disabilities.

Navigation

We’ve made navigation links consistent between pages throughout the site. The site is also fully accessible using only the keyboard and can be navigated with scripting disabled.

Pop-up windows

Our website does not use pop-up windows unless they are appropriate. Acceptable cases, for example, are when it is important to see the browser window you’ve just navigated from in the background.