The results of a recent survey of the websites of UK Financial Services companies reveal a
disturbing variance in the standards of public facing websites. The survey shows that some sites are achieving
10 out of 10 for accessibility and performance whilst competitors in the same sector score marks a hundred
times worse. The results are published in the July edition of the Financial Services Website Accessibility Report produced by Mediasurface, the leading AIM-listed web content management provider.
The research analysed the accessibility and performance of 727 UK Financial Services websites and was carried out
in partnership with SiteMorse (www.sitemorse.com) the market leading automated website testing services
provider. Tests were carried out between Friday 21 and Monday 24 July 2006 for this second joint quarterly
report and covered companies in Banking (Retail and Wholesale), Financial Investment Institutions, Insurance, Professional Services (Legal and Accounting) and Consumer Finance (Building and Friendly Societies, Mortgage
Lenders, IFA's etc).
Approximately a quarter of sites failed basic 'A' accessibility 12 websites were completely error free whilst the worst suffered 17,154 errors ? The Charcol website was found to have the fastest response time; the slowest was measured as 276 times slower. The fastest download speed was the European Central Bank, with the slowest 3,798 times slower
There was good news for Guardian Financial Services (www.guardianfs.co.uk) who passed both A and AA
accessibility tests on each page of their website scoring a perfect 10/10 SiteMorse mark. Solus Funds
(www.solusfunds.com) and Millfield Partnerships (www.millfield-partnership.co.uk) came second and third respectively.
Andy Peart, Chief Marketing Officer for Mediasurface commented: "This latest Mediasurface and SiteMorse Report clearly demonstrates there is a huge difference in the way companies in the Financial Services conduct
themselves online. Although Accessibility and Performance may be being talked about within the UK Financial
Services sector as a way to differentiate online customer service, people responsible for website content within
these organisations are yet to take this topic seriously".
More details on the report
www.mediasurface.com/downloads

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