Free one-off report · no sign-up · weekly monitoring from £5 a month
Council documents accessibility check
Paste the web address of your council’s minutes, agendas or documents page. We find the PDFs on it and check each one against common, machine-detectable PDF/UA-1 and WCAG 2.2 problems, then give you an evidence report you can print or save. Want it every week? Try weekly monitoring free for 4 weeks.
Works best with the page that lists your minutes and agendas. A home page also works: we follow up to six minutes, agendas or documents links on the same site. Up to 25 PDFs are checked, newest first where dates are visible.
Results
| Document | Pages | Result | Problems found |
|---|
This is a quick automated check, not a full audit. It reads each file’s structure and settings; it cannot judge whether headings, reading order, table headers or alternative text are correct. A file with no problems found here can still fail a full PDF/UA-1 validation. In our own test of 20 council PDFs, 3 had no problems found by these quick checks but all 20 failed a full veraPDF PDF/UA-1 validation. Nothing on this page certifies compliance with the Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations 2018.
What the free check looks for
- Scanned pages with no real text
- Image-only scans cannot be read aloud or searched. WCAG 2.2 1.1.1 and 1.4.5.
- No tags
- Without a tag structure, screen readers get no headings, lists, tables or reading order. WCAG 2.2 1.3.1 and 1.3.2; PDF/UA-1 7.1.
- No document language
- Screen readers may use the wrong voice and pronunciation. WCAG 2.2 3.1.1; PDF/UA-1 7.2.
- No real title
- Missing titles, or titles like “Microsoft Word - minutes.docx”. WCAG 2.2 2.4.2; PDF/UA-1 7.1.
- Images without alternative text
- Image tags with no description. WCAG 2.2 1.1.1; PDF/UA-1 7.3.
- Also noted
- Whether the file declares PDF/UA, shows its title in the window, uses a valid language code, or is encrypted.
Weekly monitoring
New minutes and agendas go up every month, so a one-off check goes out of date quickly. Monitoring runs this same check for you automatically.
- Give us your documents page address and an email address, and confirm by email.
- We scan the page straight away, record every PDF on it and check the newest 25.
- Every week we scan again, check each new PDF and re-check ones that had problems, so fixes show up.
- You get an email when new PDFs appear (and a short summary once a month), with a dated document register attached.
Your dashboard keeps a dated scan log and document register you can print or download as CSV, plus wording you could adapt for your accessibility statement. Everything is automatic: no one reviews or changes your documents.
Pricing
Free one-off report
£0
Check one council documents page now and get a report on up to 25 of its PDFs, to download as CSV or print and save as PDF. No sign-up, no card. Run it again whenever you like; it stays free.
Weekly monitoring, one council
£5 a month or £49 a year
Weekly scans, email reports, dated document register and scan log. The first 4 weeks are free with no card: sign up below.
5 or more councils
£35 a year per council
For clerks and providers who look after 5 or more councils on one email address. Choose how many councils at checkout (at least 5).
What you get free, and what you pay for
- Free, always: the one-off report on this page, as often as you like.
- Free for 4 weeks: weekly monitoring of a council’s documents page, from the day you confirm your email. No card needed.
- After 4 weeks: weekly scans pause unless you buy a plan. Nothing is charged automatically. Your dashboard, document register and scan log are kept, and paying restarts the scans straight away.
- Paid: weekly monitoring carries on for as long as you pay. Cancel any time from the billing portal (linked on your dashboard and in every email we send you once you have paid); monitoring runs to the end of the period you have paid for, then pauses.
Pay with the same email address you use (or will use) for monitoring and the payment attaches to your council automatically. Already monitoring? Your dashboard has buy buttons linked to your council. Secure checkout by Stripe; Brightbench appears on your statement. Manage an existing subscription.
Council PDF Monitor terms in brief (these add to our terms of service): for councils and the people who act for them, not consumers. It is an automated check of common, machine-detectable PDF problems, not an audit, and it does not certify compliance with the accessibility regulations. Billed monthly or yearly in advance by Stripe until you cancel; no refunds for part periods unless we stop the service early, in which case we refund the unused part. See also our privacy notice.
Start 4 free weeks of weekly monitoring
What we store and why
We store the page address, council name and email address you give us, plus the list of PDFs we find and their check results, so we can scan weekly, email you the results and keep your evidence log. We send automatic emails about this monitor only to the address you confirm, and nothing else. We do not share the data or use it for marketing. It is stored on Cloudflare, our hosting provider. If you buy a plan, Stripe handles the payment and we keep the Stripe customer and subscription references, the plan, its status and the email and council name given at checkout, so we can switch monitoring on or off. If you do not confirm within 7 days the request is deleted. You can stop monitoring or delete everything at any time from your dashboard or any email. See our privacy notice. Prefer the phone? Call 020 3949 1795.
Questions
Is the one-off report really free?
Yes. Paste a council documents page address and we check up to 25 PDFs on it and give you a report you can download as CSV or print and save as PDF. No sign-up, no card, as often as you like.
How much does weekly monitoring cost?
One council costs £5 a month or £49 a year. The first 4 weeks are free with no card, and nothing is charged automatically: after 4 weeks the scans pause unless you buy a plan. Clerks and providers with 5 or more councils pay £35 a year per council. No VAT is added: Brightbench Ventures Ltd is not currently VAT-registered.
What does the check look for?
Scanned pages with no real text, missing tags, no document language, no real title and images without alternative text, mapped to WCAG 2.2 and PDF/UA-1.
Does a clean result mean our PDFs are compliant?
No. It is a quick automated check of common, machine-detectable problems, not an audit, and it does not certify compliance with the Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Can I cancel monitoring?
Yes, any time from the billing portal. Monitoring runs to the end of the period you have paid for, then pauses.