Key Dates
2024 round now closed.
> View more information about our Grants Program
We can help. Contact us:
grants@accan.org.au
or phone 02 9288 4000
Subscribe to Grants Program mailings
New research commissioned by ACCAN that has found only 7% of people who are dissatisfied with their way their provider has handled a problem or complaint take it to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO).
Read more: Research reveals telco complaints are underreported
Social media allows anyone with an internet connection to connect with other people and participate online, but for people with a hearing, sight or mobility impairment, social media websites and applications are not always easy to use. New research by Media Access Australia examines the accessibility of the most popular social media tools and shares practical advice from users on how to overcome inaccessible features.
Read more: Sociability: social media for people with a disability - Research
The Mind the Gap report, authored by Dr. Linda Leung from the University of Technology Sydney, explores the experiences of refugees as communications consumers in Australia, and describes a trial education program aimed at developing higher level communications literacies during the settlement process.
Read more: Mind The Gap: Refugees and communications technology literacy
The Another Barrier? report provides a snapshot of the challenges faced by not-for-profit organisations and the people they support in the Northern Rivers region of NSW. As Australia moves into the era of the digital economy and the National Broadband Network (NBN), not-for profits are increasingly finding themselves as brokers of phone and internet access for their clients who continue to struggle with the basics of availability, affordability, and accessibility of ICT.
Fair Go: Complaint Resolution for Digital Australia offers insights into challenges faced at a time of rapid changes to the digital environment. The Occasional Paper, written by John T.D. Wood, was commissioned by ACCAN in order to broaden and stimulate debate regarding external complaints resolution schemes.
Read more: Fair Go: Complaint Resolution for Digital Australia
This short report details the development of the Newell Network website www.newell.org.au, a growing community-based space that empowers individuals with complex communication needs and support organisations to share information about telecommunciations products that work for them. The reflections on the project from Novita Children's Services and partners are a valuable record of the collaborative potential in a web 2.0 approach to empowering people with disabilities.
Telecommunications and Deafblind Australians provides the results of a survey of 71 respondents experiencing deafblindness and is the first research of its kind in Australia to focus specifically on telecommunications access and usage. The research, conducted by Able Australia and supported by a grant from ACCAN, calls for better support for deafblind Australians to access the customised telecommunications solutions that are vital to their day-to-day lives.
The Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN) and Media Access Australia (MAA) commissioned the Australia Institute to research the level of the Australian community’s awareness and use of closed captions on TV.
Research report on caption awareness [Adobe PDF - 117 KB]
Research report on caption awareness [Word - 99 KB]
The tragic events in Queensland have demonstrated many of the strengths and unfortunately some of the weaknesses of Australia’s emergency services and warnings systems. This report explores one important dimension of our emergency management framework, namely access to emergency services and emergency information by people who have a disability, particularly those who are Deaf or have a speech or hearing impairment.
Read more: The Queensland flood disaster: Access for people with disability
The Footscray Legal Community Centre (FCLC) together with ACCAN has released a report entitiled Taking Advantage of Disadvantage: Case studies of refugee and new migrant experiences in the communications market, finding that in many cases telcos are taking advantage of this already disadvantaged and highly vulnerable group.
Telecommunications access and affordability among people experiencing financial hardship
Anglicare Victoria looked at over 300 of its low-income clients to investigate how they accessed telecommunications and whether they considered these services affordable.
The overwhelming conclusion was that telecommunications are not universally accessible. This is because 49% of those in the survey did not have home internet, and 56% didn't have mobile internet – such as a smartphone or a dongle. Two-thirds of mobile phone users had difficulty paying their phone bills and a similar number of people ran out of credit on their pre-paid mobile service sooner than they expected.
The full report is available on the ACCAN website.
ACCAN commissioned the South Australian Council of Social Services (SACOSS) to conduct a research project on the affordability of telecommunications for low-income consumers. The research project was split into two phases: the first phase assessed the adequacy of the Centrelink Telephone Allowance (CTA) and the second phase assessed the extent to which poverty affects the purchasing options of low income consumers. The research found there are many additional costs such as those due to making smaller purchases, reconnection costs and overdue payments. These additional costs are known as the poverty premium.