Help

Accessibility

We are committed to continually improving our website to make it more accessible and usable for everyone. Our accessibility page offers advice that will help you get the best from our website. More about accessibility

Contact us

Find out how to contact us.

Documents to download

Our website offers some information as documents to download using Adobe's Portable Document Format (PDF), Microsoft Word or Excel. The file size for each document is given.

Don't worry if you haven't got the software on your computer to open these documents. You can download free viewers from Adobe and Microsoft. A link to download the appropriate viewer is given with every document download.

Problems with PDFs

If you have a problem opening some PDF files you can try the following:

• In Acrobat Reader 5, select Edit | Preferences | Options. If Allow fast web view is checked, uncheck it and click OK. Try opening the PDF file again.
• In Acrobat Reader 6 and 7, select Edit | Preferences | Internet. If Allow fast web view is checked, uncheck it and click OK. Try opening the PDF file again.

Bookmarks and adding favourites

Once you've found the pages you're interested in, you can create bookmarks to them or add them as favourites in your web browser. This means you can visit the page again without having to remember the address or search for it again.

• Internet Explorer: Click on Favourites then Add to Favourites
• Netscape: Click on Communicator then Bookmarks > Add Bookmark
• Mozilla Firefox: Click on Bookmarks then Bookmark This Page

Please note, from time to time we have to change the location of pages on the website. When this happens you may need to update your bookmarks and favourites to reflect these changes.

Hints and tips

You may find these helpful when using our website. The keyboard shortcuts below will work on any website.

Breadcrumb trail

Use the clickable breadcrumb trail to help you find your way around our website. The breadcrumb trail is the horizontal "You are here:" text that appears below the horizontal, dark green main navigation menu at the top of every page. This changes to show you where you are in the website.

For example, if you click on Business then Business rates in the "Browse by service" menu, the breadcrumb trail will change to:

"Your are here : Home > Council services > Business > Business rates"

You can click on each item to jump back to the previous level.

Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

If you have a specific question about a council service, you may be able to find the answer in our database of FAQs. You can also click the FAQ link in the main navigation menu (see "Finding information" point [5] above).

Browse frequently asked questions

Keyboard shortcuts

Here are just a few of the available keyboard shortcuts to help you when using the web. Please note these shortcuts are specific to Internet Explorer although many will work with other browsers such as Firefox.

Alt + left arrow = go to the previous page (same as using the browser "Back" button)
Alt + right arrow = go to the next page
Ctrl + F = brings up the "Find" box. You can use this to find a term on the web page you are on
Ctrl + Home = jumps to the top of the web page you're looking at (saves you scrolling on long pages)
Ctrl + End = jumps to the end of the web page you're looking at
Ctrl + N = opens a new browser window
Ctrl + W = closes the current browser window
Ctrl + P = prints the page you're looking at (see "Printing" below)
Tab = moves through items on a web page (eg links, search box)
Shift + tab = moves through items backwards on a web page (eg links, search box)

Printing

To print out a web page, use your browser print option (in the File menu) or click the "Print" link (in the footer menu at the bottom of every page on the left-hand side). Only the main content of the page will be printed out. The top and side menus are removed so that less paper is used and the page is easier to read.

You can also use the keyboard shortcut "Ctrl + P" to print out a page.

But please - think before you print. Only print when you really need to.

Technical problems

If you have any technical problems with using this website, please email our Web Manager using the contact details on the right. When reporting problems, specific information such as the content of any error message or what you were doing just before the problem occurred will help us to find a solution.