Word Common Accessibility Errors and Fixes

Title (all documents must have a title)

  1. Select the title text (the document title should display at the top of page one and should not be repeated on any other pages)
  2. On the "Home" tab, click "Styles Pane" and select "Heading 1" ("Heading 1" designates the document title. There should only be one "Heading 1" style applied in the document.)

Tip: How to change default heading styles in Word

  • You can set your own default heading styles that stay the same everytime you open a new Word document.
  • On the menu bar, select Format>Style
  • Select the default heading style you want to change
  • Click "Modify" and make your formatting changes (paragraph settings are changed in the format dropdown)
  • Before clicking "OK" on the "Modify Style" pop up, check "Add to template", on a Mac, or "New documents based on this template", on Windows
  • Click "OK' on the "Modify Style" pop up
  • Click "Apply" on the "Style" pop up

Headings

  1. Select the text you want to be a heading
  2. On the "Home" tab, click "Styles Pane" and select the heading style

Tip: How to use headings

Short documents may only have one heading, the page title, "Heading 1".  In longer documents, headings help organize content into sections and allow users to skim and jump to relevant content.

  • The first heading style applied after the title must be a "Heading 2"
  • Headings should be formatted to look different than paragraph text (example: use larger font sizes or bold formatting).
  • Do not rely on color alone to distinguish one heading from another.

  • Nested heading styles must be applied in ascending order, similar to an outline

    Example for Fruit (H1):

    Apples (Heading 2)

    Red Delicious (Heading 3)

    Golden (Heading 3)

    Granny Smith (Heading 3)

    Grapes (Heading 2)

    Pears (Heading 2)

Image Alt Text

  1. Click on the image (or the border of a SmartArt graphic or chart)
  2. On the "Picture Format" tab,  click "Alt Text"
  3. In the "Alt Text" pane, type the image description in the text box (click the "x" to close the "Alt Text" pane).

Tip: How to write image alt text

All images should have alt text that describes the image in a way that someone who can't see it would understand what the image is of. Avoid using images with embedded text. If you must use an image with embedded text, include the text that's on the image in the alt text.

Color Contrast

You will need to manually check that colors have enough contrast. WCAG 2.0 level AA requires a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text.

Links

  • Linked text should describe the content on the page it's linking to
  • Avoid linking generic text like "click here" and "read more". Link descriptive text instead.
  • Avoid linking long URLs. Link descriptive text instead.

Text

  • Avoid using all caps

Tables

  1. Select the table (click in a cell or click and drag over table)
  2. Click the "Table Design" tab
  3. Check the box next to "Header Row"

Don't use tables for layout. Tables should only be used for data and the table must have a header row at the top. Don't use split cells, merged cells, or nested tables.

Reading Order

The position and level of headings in the document determine the reading order. For an overview of the heading hierarchy and order:

  1. Click the "View" tab
  2. Check the box next to "Navigation Pane"
  3. Click the document map icon

To change the reading order, change the style/position of headings in the document.

Check Word Doc Accessibility

  1. Click the "Review" Tab
  2. Click "Check Accessibility"
  3. Fix errors in your document that display in the Accessibility pane.

Autotag Word Doc

Select File>Save As>PDF and check the box next to "Document structure tags for accessibility"

Introduction to Next-Gen CMS