Rant about MSTeams accessibility

By Louise, 1 April, 2024

Forum
Windows

Hey gang, I thought this might be a good place to rant a bit about accessibility of Microsoft Teams. I have an iPad on my desk at work for no other reason than to take Teams meetings. The Windows version is so clunky to use with a screen reader. It doesn't tell me if my hand is up or down, when people come and go from meetings, or if others have their hands up or down.
I read through the Microsoft documentation, and they appear to think that I have all the time in the world during a meeting to tab and tab and tab to do the simplest thing.

So, one might think that having Teams on my iPad would be a good work-around. It's the best I can do, but it's far from good. Yes, Voiceover announces when people come and go from meetings, and when people raise their hands, but there are absolutely no key commands for things like mute-unmute, raise-lower hand, etc.

In general, I also find that Microsoft hasn't comtemplated at all that a blind person might actually be leading a teams meeting, so would need quick and smooth access to information, so we could concentrate on the meeting, and not on the clunky to nonexistent accessibility features.

If anyone has ideas or knowledge that I don't about how to use Teams better with ZoomText Magnifier Reader, I welcome it. Zoomtext uses basically the same commands as Jaws, so Jaws users may also have good suggestions.

I want to flag that I know this is mostly a ran!, so would ask anyone who wants to answer that I should contact Microsoft to just keep that to themselves. I have, on multiple occasions, and nothing has changed.

Options

Comments

By Brian on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

I did a contract IT job a few years ago and we used Teams. On my iPhone (at that time) it was amazing. Since then, the iOS/iPadOS versions have undergone a few updates that have made the app less than stellar.

And don't even get me started on the Windows version.

Honestly, I just wish everyone used Zoom. I find Zoom for both Mac and Windows enjoyable.

/end 2 cents.

By Lee on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

Hi, How did you manage to install teams on iOS? I agree in windows it is really clunky so tried it on my phone. Total mare trying to authenticate/login. Gave up in the end. Zoom way more easy.

By Tara on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

Hi Louise and all,
It might be worth trying the desktop app on Windows with JAWS. JAWS has a feature called 'screen echo'. If you press JAWS key + S, it toggles through all, highlighted and none. If you select 'all', parts of the screen are announced which usually wouldn't be announced. By default it's set to 'highlighted'. You might be able to know who's raising their hand and entering etc. if you set it to 'all'. I tried this years ago when Skype was installed, and JAWS was announcing things it wouldn't usually have announced like people signing into Skype etc. Ordinarily I would have needed scripts to hear that. I don't know if NVDA and Narrator have a screen echo function. Maybe ZoomText has something similar to screen echo? I've never found anything like it in the NVDA manual I don't think. As for Teams, there are keystrokes for raising your hand and admitting people, but it seems from reading the documentation that you aren't getting notifications about who's raising their hand and waiting to be admitted etc.. I use Teams, but I only use the web app, and I only have one-to-one calls, so I've never been in a meeting. Here are the Teams keystrokes for those who want them.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/office/keyboard-shortcuts-for-microsoft-teams-2e8e2a70-e8d8-4a19-949b-4c36dd5292d2

I must say the lack of shortcuts for iPad is terrible.

By gailisaiah on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

If you are a Jaws user, Freedom Scientific has trainings on Teams. And they recently came out with a training podcast called "An introduction to the news Teams in Jaws".

By Louise on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

Thanks everyone, and yes, I knew about the limited keystrokes they have in Teams for Windows for participating in a meeting, but they do not come close to providing the same experience as sighted users get. If I could choose, I would definitely choose Zoom every time.

What really steams me is Microsoft crowing about their supposed commitment to accessibility. PowerPoint is a nightmare, Excel charts are virtually useless, and I've said enough about the accessibility disaster that is Teams.

Thanks for letting me rant, and for a little commiseration.

By al-Salil on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

I agree that Teams could be better.
However, I find it absolutely usable with NVDA.
I use the desktop app on Windows with NVDA and as I said it works quite well.
I also use it on my iPhone and the iOS app is nice in my opinion.
Here the other day I was in a Teams meeting at work and I participated in the meeting from the desktop app of Teams on Windows.
NVDA announced when people raised their hands etc.
General use works fine but I agree that the UI is a bit clunky at times.

By TheBllindGuy07 on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

Teams on windows and even somehow on mac with chrome is very accessible compared to the system wide spread actual disruptive bugs of macos and voiceover.

By SeasonKing on Wednesday, April 3, 2024 - 02:09

I find teams even more accessible then Zoom or any other meeting software.
Yes, I hate it's keyboard shortcuts, even with the new teams, but it's improoving for sure.
Areas where I want keyboard shortcuts to take me inclued the people pane in meetings, keyboard shortcuts to quickly make participants presenters or mute/unmute participants etc.
Here's 1 killer feature of teams that no other platform offers. Use Powerpoint live share or Excel live share to present your files to participants, and the screen reader users would be able to go through the shared file as though it's opened on their local machine.
I was working on an excel sheet with a coligue, and the live share enabled me to look at that excel file as though it's opened on my machine, read everything with my screenreader, even make changes.
I wish if I could also controle other PCs like how sighted people are able to share controles of screens to others. Comes damn handy to quickly resolve any issues or for troubleshooting.

By Tara on Wednesday, April 10, 2024 - 02:09

Hi SeasonKing,
Thanks for the clarification. Glad it works with JAWS too.