Accessible E commerce Forum: Notes of meeting Wednesday 28 March 2001
Present:
Dr Sev Ozdowski, Disability Discrimination Commissioner
Frank Cicutto, Chair, ABA
Graeme Innes, Deputy Disability Discrimination Commissioner
David Bell, CEO, Australian Bankers' Association
Nick Hossack, Australian Bankers' Association
Bruce Maguire, Blind Citizens Australia
Mark Relf, Physical Disability Council of Australia
Helen Scott, Information Manager, Council on the Ageing
John McKenna, Internet Industry Association Taskforce
Bridget Larsen, Australian Information Industry Association
Karen Smith, Public Affairs Adviser, Credit Union Services Corporation
Bernadette Levett, Manager Disability Services,
Telstra Mark Bagshaw, International Marketing Manager, IBM Australasia
Michael Small, Karen Toohey, Rob Lake HREOC
Apologies: Amanda Davies, A/g Assistant Secretary, Human Rights Branch, Attorney General's Department; Bill Healey, Australian Retailers' Association (NSW); Paul Waterhouse, Property Council of Australia
1. Welcome:
Commissioner Ozdowski welcomed participants and congratulated the Forum on the way it had worked to identify cooperative approaches to addressing the issues identified in the Commission's e commerce report.
Frank Cicutto also congratulated the Forum, and committed the ABA to continued support. He acknowledged the importance of the Forum in contributing to finding solutions to the digital divide and beginning the journey towards accessible ecommerce in Australia. He made a commitment, as current chair of the ABA, to achieving the objectives of the Industry Action plan and promoting the industry standards throughout the industry. He said that the ABA Council would monitor the industry's progress, and that he saw the action plan as the key enabler for industry.
David Bell acknowledged the work of Jeff Oughton and Nick Hossack. He committed the ABA to lodging the Action Plan by the end of April and to the development of the industry standards by the end of 2001.
2. ABA Action Plan - Initial comments:
Participants were reminded that more detailed discussion on the draft and the work of the Working Groups would be possible later in the meeting.
Mark Bagshaw welcomed the actions taken by the ABA and raised the question of how the implementation of the Plan would proceed, whether the ABA would play a role as the driver. He suggested implementation issues be considered as part of the development of the standards over the next few months.
Bruce Maguire also welcomed the commitments made in the plan and noted that being able to follow the progress in implementation through accessible web pages was essential.
David Bell indicated considerable work had already been done on ensuring the ABA webpage was accessible and that fixing any outstanding access barriers would be a priority.
Helen Scott raised the issue of timeframes for implementation, particularly for ATMs, and the possibility of retrofitting. She said that though the availability of standards was good, they, in themselves, would not fix the digital divide. She stressed the need for education as an important strategy.
Mark Relf asked who would take responsibility for modifying ATMs after the standards had been developed and noted that the DDA is a driver in terms of compliance requirements. He also highlighted the need for a clearer definition of the review and evaluation process.
David Bell noted that many of the issues raised would be items for discussion later in the meeting. He stressed that the ABA had no authority to impose implementation of the standards on industry and that each bank would have to develop their own implementation strategy. He noted, however, that there would be an expectation that by participating in the process banks would see the value in adopting the standards in their own action plans. He stated that more detail concerning evaluation and review will be developed and that the short timelines appeared quite manageable as much of the work necessary to develop the standards had been done at an international level. He concluded by stating that the ABA is committed to resourcing the drafting of standards and facilitating the working groups.
Commissioner Ozdowski, Frank Cicutto and David Bell then left the meeting due to other commitments.
3. Further discussion on Action Plan and implementation
Nick Hossack noted a need to not delay the introduction of current best practice while waiting for the perfect solution. The aim is to get the most accessible ATMs available now, so that when banks are seeking to buy ATMs, there are clearer choices.
Graeme Innes discussed why it was proposed to pursue industry standards rather than a formal Standards Australia standard. Principally an industry standard allows for the possibility of more flexibility in coping with technological change. There is also an issue concerning the time taken to develop Australian Standards through the formal process and the fact that they are not freely available or accessible.
Mark Relf suggested that some components of the industry standard, such as location, glare might be made prescriptive through reference to other standards. He noted that an industry standard would not in itself be binding under the DDA.
Nick Hossack asked what people thought about discussions relating to ATMs and safety currently underway through another process being brought into the Forums work.
Helen Scott noted that this is an important priority for older people and there was general agreement that this issue should become part of the ATM working groups' work.
There was considerable discussion about the role of the Forum and the ABA in implementation of the industry standards. Mark Bagshaw noted that the objective of the e commerce forum was not to simply develop standards, but to achieve accessible e commerce and asked what role there would be for the Forum after the Standards. He suggested a role for the Forum in implementation. He suggested the need for parallel work on implementation at the same time as the Standards.
The ABA pointed out that as an association they had no authority to impose an implementation timeframe on their individual members. As there is no guarantee that the standards produced will satisfy the DDA, the ABA cannot advise banks to adopt the standard in absolute confidence they will comply with the law. As entitities, banks must make this risk assessment themselves. The ABA can promote them as best practice accessibility, but the core risk assessment must be independently made. The ABA will do all it can to ensure their members participate in the process and will promote the industry standards, when developed, within the industry. While it would be up to the individual banks to decide whether or not to implement the standards there would clearly be an expectation that individual banks would recognise the legal, commercial and customer service benefits from implementation. Adoption of the industry standards would be a significant step for industry.
Graeme Innes noted that it may be possible to upgrade as well as replace ATMs, and that the timeframe for implementation was the responsibility of the individual banks or other financial institutions. If individual institutions wanted to have some confidence that their actions would reduce the chances of complaints they would need to work closely with the community to find consensus on a timeframe acceptable to all concerned. Where people were not satisfied with proposed implementation programs they would continue to be free to pursue their concerns through a DDA action.
It was noted that internal industry standards do not have the status of DDA Standards, but that some aspects of industry standards might at some point be considered for incorporation into AS1428 or even a future DDA Standard on access to premises.
There was general agreement that an important role for the various working groups would be to identify the range of implementation issues that might assist individual financial institutions to achieve a effective and timely implementation.
4. Working Groups
It was agreed that ABA would convene the working groups. HREOC would participate, but its role as a complaints handling body means it would not be appropriate for the Commission to take a leadership role. Given the proposed industry standards will have relevance to the whole financial industry CUSCAL and APBS are important partners in the process.
Graeme Innes then proposed membership organisations for the 4 working groups. A separate approach is to be made to relevant organisations in the Smart Card sector who are not currently represented at the Forum. It was noted that there is a need to have a core membership of the working groups responsible for the general policy directions, but that there would be a need to invite other technical, manufacturing and development expertise from organisations and bodies that may have a commercial interest in the issues under discussion. Care will need to be taken to ensure policy issues are kept separate as far as possible from commercial interests.
There was also discussion about the involvement of other disability sector representatives to ensure broad expertise or to enable effective participation. It was acknowledged that any organisation on the working groups would seek to identify the best person for the role and that might involve recruiting someone from another organisation. The
ABA will develop a plan to convene working groups, and will then seek nominations for people from the groups concerned. It was also noted that Association of Permanent Building Societies, the Property Council of Australia and the Australian Retailers Association would be approached to confirm their willingness to participate in the relevant working groups.
Proposed working groups are:
EFTPOS
ABA, BCA, CUSCAL, PDCA, APBS, COTA, Retailers Association, HREOC
ATM
ABA, PCA, CUSCAL, PDCA, APBS, BCA, COTA, HREOC
Phone Banking
ABA, COTA, CUSCAL, BCA, APBS, Australian Association of the Deaf, Telstra,
HREOC noted that it was important to seek comment from National Council on Intellectual Disability on the reasonableness of the existing IVR standards for people with intellectual disabilities.
Internet Access
APBS, COTA, ABA, PDCA, CUSCAL, BCA, IIA, HREOC
5. Reports
Telstra
Launched Centre for Online Accessibility. Research facility in Melbourne to be based with the Human Factors Research area at Telstra. It will be an internal resource for online product managers. Its first priority will be online applications and services.
IBM
Working on strategies to ensure accessibility of all their products, and how to best ensure innovation takes place within IBM.
IIA
Final draft of the IIA/AIMIA Action Plan is completed. It has been signed off by AIMIA Board, shortly to be signed off by IIA Board. It will be distributed for comment for 6-8 weeks. HREOC offered input regarding promotion. Target will be IIA/AIMIA members.
AIIA
AIIA is focussing on distributing information to their members and raising the profile of accessibility. AIIA would be happy to contribute in any way to the relevant working groups. Review of web page will increase availability and prominence of accessibility issues.
CUSCAL
CUSCAL are in the process of seeking executive approval for release of an action plan for consultation. CUSCAL as a service provider plans to develop its own action plan.
COTA
2 Conferences planned which may be useful venues to target this issue. There has been extensive use of listservs, COTA publications and website to distribute information. See a role for COTA in education and promoting awareness if resourced. A separate summary of initiatives will be circulated to Forum members later.
BCA
The Roundtable on Information Provision is changing its focus to reflect changes in information provision, particularly in relation to web and other systems. The 2001 Conference in Brisbane will feature a keynote address on accessible IVR.
6. Next meeting
The next meeting will be held at 9.30am on July 11 at HREOC in Conference Room 1, Level 17.