E-GOVERNMENT
Local government Web sites are failing
15-04-2003
by John Cradden
Irish County Councils are failing to meet basic guidelines on making Web sites accessible and user-friendly, according to a new study.
The study, conducted by a research team at Ennis Information Age Services (EIAS), found that most of the 34 County Council Web sites tested tended to be difficult to read and actively discouraged users.
"Our research finds that most Irish County Councils have mirrored the physical structure of their organisation on to their Web sites rather than create a virtual office structure that focuses on the needs of the user," said Pat Fehin, head of usability at EIAS.
The study also found that many County Council sites are too heavy in copy. "You need a different writing style for the web," said Fehin. "Reading on-line is 25 percent slower than reading hard copy."
Simply dumping brochure copy onto a Web site results in needless scrolling, eye strain and is a turn off for the user, he said. "Where it is necessary to use a long document such as a brochure or pdf file, an easy print option should be provided for the user."
On the positive side, many County Councils performed extremely well in responding to e-mails to their sites. Out of 34 County and City Councils who were sent e-mail enquiries, 22 responded in less than two hours, while six responded within one working day. Another five, however, did not respond at all.
Part of the logic of County Councils maintaining good Web sites is to provide on-line services that negate trips to the council offices, yet none of them provided useful on-line interactive services of this kind, according to the EIAS study.
"Convenience is an important motivating factor in getting users to continue to use a site," said Fehin. "Yet none of the councils surveyed took advantage of this important selling point.
"In one example, a Web site allowed users to fill out an application form for a driving licence. However, to obtain the licence, the user had to print off the application form and either bring it to the council office or post it."
Making sites easy to use for users with disabilities is a good way of improving the overall usability of Web sites, but unfortunately many of the council Web sites were overly complex in their technical design.
For instance, many sites required JavaScript to be enabled. "This is a major restriction for people with disabilities as it fails to take into account that screen readers cannot read Java," said Fehin.
Fehin said that the study took into account accessibility issues but found that few of the Web sites met basic guidelines for accessibility for people with disabilities as set down by the WAI (Web Accessibility Initiative)".
The report comes hot on the heels of a UK government internal audit that found nearly 80 percent of central government Web sites needed to be redesigned before they could be accessible to users with disabilities.
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