Is your company ready to tap into the talent and multi-million pound spending power of York's 30,000 disabled people, and 97,000 throughout North Yorkshire?

If not, you need to start planning now - before the business case is backed up by new legal duties affecting all service providers and small employers.

Many companies have already made changes to the way they deliver services to ensure that disabled people can use them or to workplaces if they have disabled members of staff. Nevertheless, all businesses should be aware of two important changes to the Disability Discrimination Act that come into force from October.

First, the part of the Act that protects disabled people against discrimination at work will be extended to cover small employers - those with fewer than 15 staff. This means, for the first time, disabled workers will have the same rights at work, regardless of the size of company they work for. Employers need to ensure they don't discriminate against disabled employees or job applicants on grounds of disability and to consider making reasonable adjustments in the workplace.

Second, all businesses that offer services to the public will, for the first time, be required to make reasonable changes to physical barriers that prevent disabled people accessing their services. There is no rule book, different people have different needs, and some companies can afford to do more than others.

For example, it would not be reasonable for a small firm with a tight budget to undertake the same level of structural alteration that a big national company could easily finance.

Either way, it makes sense to think ahead and to incorporate alterations into other planned refurbishments.

Even for the smallest companies, a lot can be done relatively cheaply. Improving lighting and signage, installing a hearing loop or simply moving furniture won't break the bank, but might make the world of difference for partially-sighted or hearing-impaired customers.

If physical barriers can't reasonably be changed, firms need to think about providing their services in a different way - by visiting the customer at home or taking the products to them at the till, for example.

Now - not tomorrow - is the time to take stock and think about what needs to be done for disabled customers, employees and job applicants.

The Department for Work and Pensions has produced a video, Act Now, designed to help businesses understand their responsibilities. Free advice on all aspects of the Disability Discrimination Act is also available from the Disability Rights Commission, which has a helpline and a range of guidance setting out examples of the sort of reasonable adjustments that can be considered.

Updated: 11:02 Friday, March 05, 2004