Accessible documents policy

This policy explains how accessible the documents published by the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority on behalf of Government Project Delivery on projectdelivery.gov.uk are.

It covers PDFs, spreadsheets, presentations and other types of documents. It does not cover content published on projectdelivery.gov.uk as HTML, which the main accessibility statement covers.

We publish documents in formats including:

• PDF
• ODT
• Excel (.xlsx)
• CSV
• PowerPoint (.ppt)

We want as many people as possible to be able to use these documents. When we produce a document, we aim to:

• provide an HTML alternative where possible
• tag headings and other parts of the document properly, so screen readers can understand the structure
• include alt text for non-decorative images
• avoid using tables except for data
• write in plain English

New documents and documents you need to download to access a service should be fully accessible.

However, some documents are not accessible. For example:

• they are not tagged properly, for example, they do not contain headings
• figures and images in them may not have text descriptions
• they are not written in plain English

This mostly applies to:

• PDFs and other documents published before 23 September 2018
• audio and video content
• documents linked to from old news and blog posts

These types of documents are exempt from the regulations, so we do not plan to make them accessible.

If you need information from one of these documents, contact us for an alternative format.

If you need a document we have published in a different format, use the request an accessible format form.

You will get a response within 15 working days.

If you find any problems that aren’t listed on this page or you think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact us.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’).

If you contact us with a complaint and you’re not happy with our response contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

The National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority, on behalf of Government Project Delivery, is committed to making its documents accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

The documents that the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority, on behalf of Government Project Delivery, publishes are partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) version 2.2 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

PDFs and Word documents

Some PDFs and Word documents include images without text alternatives. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content).

Some PDFs contain complex tables with merged cells. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 (info and relationships).

Some documents do not have proper headings or alt text. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criteria 1.1.1 and 2.4.10.

When we publish PDFs, we aim to also publish an HTML alternative. When we publish Word documents, we aim to make sure they are accessible and can be easily converted into other formats if needed.

Generated PDFs

Some pages have a ‘Generate PDF’ button that creates a styled PDF version of the page.

These PDFs:

• are not tagged properly
• do not include headings or document structure
• may not have text alternatives for images
• do not include bookmarks or navigation aids
• do not have document metadata such as title and language
• may have reading order issues for screen readers

This means they are not fully accessible and fail WCAG 2.2 success criteria 1.1.1, 1.3.1, 1.3.2 and 2.4.2. We recommend using the HTML version of the page instead.

Spreadsheets

Some spreadsheets:

• do not have clear structure or labelled headings
• have blank column headings

This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1.

We’ll make sure new spreadsheets have an appropriate structure and ensure they can be easily converted to other formats if needed.

Some older PDFs would be a disproportionate burden to update, especially those that are very long and rarely used.

The regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards or have an HTML alternative.

To improve the accessibility of our documents published on projectdelivery.gov.uk, we:

• provide internal guidance and templates for accessible documents
• ask authors to write in plain English and publish in HTML where possible
• produce HTML alternatives for PDFs
• require authors and designers to supply accessible documents
• review and edit older documents to improve accessibility
• add alt text to graphs, diagrams and flowcharts

This page was first prepared on 26 March 2022. It was last updated in January 2026.