Accessible services

Our Accessible services resource looks at how you can adapt your customer service and communication to support autistic people.

Autism affects how people communicate and interact with the world. Autistic people interpret differently both verbal and non-verbal language, such as gestures or tone of voice.

Evidence suggests that autistic people might differ to non-autistic people in their social communication and interaction and language in ways such as:

using fewer hand and body gestures
preferring not to make eye-contact or finding this uncomfortable
preferring to work alone
finding it difficult to:
- recognise or read body language or facial expressions
- choose a tone of voice, volume or speed of speech
- judge pauses, turn-taking, or to be interrupted during conversations
- understand metaphors and idioms
using more repeated words and phrases, made-up words, formal/pedantic speech and pauses.

There are some autistic people who have intermittent, or no speech at all. They may communicate in different ways, for example, through: 

vocalisations – making sounds, rather than speaking words 
using gestures, such as pointing 
using sign language, for example, British Sign Language (BSL) 
using Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC), such as picture-based systems or Makaton.

There is no 'right' or 'better' way of communicating - all are valid and each autistic individual's preferences should be respected.

Accessible services – hints and tips

Staff training

One of the biggest barriers that autistic people face when visiting a new venue or using a new service is staff that are unsupportive because they have little or no understanding of autism. One of the best ways to support autistic people is to have staff with a good understanding of autism.  

The National Autistic Society has a range of training packages available, including Understanding autism. 

Alternatively, you could develop a bespoke training package yourself. When creating and then delivering such a package, we would encourage businesses to include autistic people to ensure the training and advice provided is relevant and truly meets the needs of autistic people.

Topics that you could consider as part of your training include:

Identifying autism and how it affects people in different ways
How to communicate with an autistic person
Sensory differences 
Identifying how to change your practice and make changes within your workplace to effectively support people.

Autism champions

You could also consider having a group of staff to act as autism champions within your company or organisation, advising and supporting others. These staff may be autistic themselves, or have a keen interest in wanting to educate themselves further and help others understand and support autistic people.

The role of an Autism Champion could include:

Being the point of contact for an autistic person 
Assisting with any access arrangements 
Answering autistic people’s questions and provide information in a suitable format
Helping any autistic customers who may be feeling stressed or need further support
Share their learning with other staff members.

The Scouts feature an extremely useful page, showing the duties of Autism-friendly Champions and the great impact they have in encouraging others to learn about autism and become more autism-friendly.

Ask autistic people

Finding ways of gathering feedback from autistic people can help to inform changes. You could contact your local National Autistic Society branch, a local special school or parents’ support group. You could consider using the topics within these guides to help you structure your feedback.

If you have any autistic employees, you could use their insight to help you adapt what you do. You could ask autistic visitors or employees, bearing in mind any unique needs they may have:

Accessibility – how accessible do you find the environment to work/visit?
Customer service – do you feel that the customer service available considered different access and communication needs?
Environment – is the environment accessible to people with diverse accessibility needs (e.g. sensory environment)?

If you already collect feedback from customers, consider including questions about disability, if you don’t already, and ask specifically about autism.  

Each individual has their own communication preferences. We would encourage you to structure your questions so they are very clearly written and to the point, leaving as little room as possible for ambiguity. If you have questions, featuring multiple parts, we would encourage you to break these down so you only ask one question at a time. Using visual supports too will help ask questions to those with certain communication needs.

Pre-visit information

Some visitors may want information to be available online before coming to your venue. Having information available in advance can help aid in visit planning and ease anxiety. This information may include:

information on how to visit/access the venue
contact information for discussing any reasonable adjustments that may need
what to expect in the venue – any facilities and sensory information that could help a visitor to familiarise themselves with the venue in advance.

Check out our guidance on making your information more accessible.

National Autistic Society branches

There are 116 volunteer-led branches across the UK, covering three quarters of the country. They offer a range of support, information and social activities for autistic adults, children and families in their local area. You can contact your local branch for advice and support to make your business more autism-friendly or to involve autistic people in designing your services. There are also online branches for autistic people with a shared interest, identity or experience.

Northern Ireland Assembly

The Northern Ireland Assembly is developing its practice to make its building accessible for autistic people and achieving an Autism Access Award. Visit their website to read about their journey, which includes appendices on notes from an autism consultation group and recommendations of things to consider when preparing for the visit of an autistic person.  

This Accessible services webpage is also available as a downloadable PDF.

Next steps

Accessible services checklist

Use our checklist (PDF format) to initially assess how autism-friendly your services are. It also includes our Accessible environments and Accessible information checklists.

Please complete our survey, so we can learn from yourselves how we can better support your business or organisation to become more autism-friendly.

The survey is provided by Smart Survey. We will not use the information provided for any other purpose. Please see privacy notice for further details of how we manage your personal information. If you have any further questions, please contact our Supporter Care team on 0808 800 1050 or at supportercare@nas.org.uk. If you would like further information about how Smart Survey process data, please see their privacy policy.

We would like to thank the Kusuma Trust for funding the creation and publication of our autism-friendly guides, making this fantastic work possible. For more information about the Kusuma Trust and their impact in the UK, Asia and Gibraltar, please visit their website.

Would you like recognition for the changes you have made?

The National Autistic Society can provide you with recognition for the changes you have made and the positive customer experience that autistic people can expect from your business. The Autism Friendly Award will consider the experience you offer autistic people and award those businesses that meet a high standard of autism-friendly practice. The award will not only celebrate your work but also signify to autistic customers and their families that you are committed to them having the best experience whilst they visit you.

Find out more about Autism Accreditation and the Autism Friendly Award.