Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Accessibility Plan Progress and Close-Out Report 2025

1. General

1.1 Contact information

The accessibility program lead for OSFI is within the Human Resources division. For more information, to provide feedback, to receive a description of our feedback process, or to request alternate formats of this Plan, please contact:

Email address: accessible@osfi-bsif.gc.ca

Accessibility Program Lead
Address:
255 Albert Street, 12th Floor
Ottawa, ON K1A 0H2
Canada
Telephone number: 1-800-385-8647
TTY: 1-800-465-7735
Fax: 613-990-5591

Feedback can be submitted anonymously or with personal information identified. All feedback will be acknowledged within 15 business days through the same means by which it was received, unless it was received anonymously.

1.2 Background on Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions

The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) is an independent federal government agency that regulates and supervises more than 400 federally regulated financial institutions to determine whether they are in sound financial condition and meet their legislated requirements. OSFI also regulates and supervises approximately 1,200 private pension plans subject to federal oversight to determine if they meet the minimum funding requirements and are complying with other requirements. Although OSFI plays an important oversight role, it does not manage the operations of financial institutions and pension plans.

The Office of the Chief Actuary is an independent unit within OSFI that provides actuarial valuation and advisory services to the federal government.

OSFI is a Schedule V agency under the Financial Administration Act (FAA) and is governed by the Public Service Employment Act (PSEA). As of March 31, 2025, OSFI had 1249 employees. OSFI has offices located in Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.

1.3 Governance

In February 2024, our Executive Committee approved the creation of the Accessibility Implementation Working Group (AIWG). The AIWG is a standing working group that reports through our formal governance structure. It consists of:

• An executive Champion
• A chair
• Advisors for early consultation, including the Mental Health and Accessibility stream of our Inclusion Network (IN) and the Employment Equity, Diversity and Advisory Committee (EEDAC)
• Subject matter experts representing each of the Accessible Canada Act priority areas of our Accessibility Plan
• Accessibility Program Lead

Our Accessibility Champion is responsible for advocating and engaging leaders, supporting the working group to address accessibility barriers with an enterprise-wide lens. The working group, with the support of the Champion and Chair, coordinates action planning across functional areas to help address accessibility barriers. The Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility (IDEA) team supports the Champion, Chair, and members of AIWG in both secretarial, research, and content creation capacities. The annual accessibility survey findings are one of the tools to help guide the work of AIWG and the planning and development of the next 3-year accessibility plan. Members of the working group also act as change agents and advocates for persons with disabilities in their areas of work to identify, remove, and prevent barriers.

The role of the working group is to:

• build awareness of accessibility considerations and barriers at OSFI
• provide advice and guidance to decision-makers
• consult with persons with disabilities
• work with employees and experts to evolve our policies, programs, and services

In 2025, the AIWG identified three priorities, encompassing 16 of 26 actions in our Accessibility Plan:

1. Emergency evacuation procedures: Sought feedback on procedures to ensure safe evacuation for persons with disabilities. Questions were included in the 2025 Accessibility Survey launched during AccessAbility Week (May 26-31).
2. Improved Access to Accessibility Information: Launched an intranet page to make it easier for employees to find and request accessibility support.
3. Communications plan: Communications, Engagement, and Stakeholder Affairs, together with HR, released messaging to raise awareness about accessibility, the Duty to Accommodate process, and make it easier to find information and request support.

1.4 Accessibility statement

OSFI is committed to supporting accessibility at all levels of our workforce. At OSFI, we are working on creating a barrier-free environment so that employees with disabilities are not prevented from providing their expertise in their service to Canada. We also want to make sure that the needs of any person with disabilities visiting our premises are always considered and met. We at OSFI understand the importance of creating accessible and inclusive environments and are dedicated to helping create a more accessible Canada.

The HR IDEA team is leading this work. However, every employee at OSFI is responsible for learning about accessibility and demonstrating inclusion in their work, their workplace, and their behaviours. We all have an important role to play.

Plan objectives

The Accessibility Plan supports employees in:

• Understanding accessibility and its impact on persons with disabilities
• Engaging persons with disabilities in policy and program development
• Designing inclusive experiences and communications
• Building skills to deliver accessible services
• Promoting a culture of accessibility

Key focus areas

1. Policies & Procedures: Apply an accessibility lens and further clarify roles and responsibilities.
2. Training & Learning: Equip staff to implement accessible practices.
3. Communications: Ensure internal and external messaging is accessible.
4. Process Integration: Embed accessibility in all aspects of work design and delivery.
5. Procurement: Consider accessibility throughout the procurement lifecycle.
6. Prioritization: Leadership will consider all the elements of the Accessibility Plan and will prioritize which to tackle first. This will be based on actions that make the biggest impact, build momentum, and drive change.

1.5 Definitions and key terminology

Accessibility

Accessibility refers to how services, technology, locations, devices, environments, and products are designed to accommodate persons with disabilities. Accessibility means giving people of all abilities equal opportunities to take part in life activities. The term implies conscious planning, design, and/or effort to make sure something is barrier-free to persons with disabilities. Accessibility also benefits the general population by making everything more usable and practical for all people.

Accessible Canada Act (ACA) Priority Areas

According to the Accessible Canada Act (2019):

The ACA priority areas refer to barriers in federal jurisdiction in the following seven priority areas: Employment, Built environment, Information and communication technologies (ICT), Communication, Procurement of goods, services and facilities, Design and delivery of programs and services, and Transportation.

Barrier

According to the Accessible Canada Act (2019):

“Barrier means anything – including anything physical, architectural, technological or attitudinal, anything that is based on information or communications or anything that is the result of a policy or a practice – that hinders the full and equal participation in society of persons with a physical, mental, intellectual, learning, communication or sensory impairment or a functional limitation.”

Disability

According to the Accessible Canada Act (2019), disability is:

“A physical, mental, intellectual, learning, communication or sensory impairment – or a functional limitation – whether permanent, temporary or episodic in nature, that, in interaction with a barrier, hinders a person’s full and equal participation in society.”

Anyone can identify as a person with a disability (PWD) if they experience one or more of these impairments or functional limitations that, in interaction with a barrier, hinders their full and equal participation in society.

Duty to Accommodate

According to the Canadian Human Rights Commission:

“Duty to Accommodate is a legal obligation (pursuant to sections 2 and 15 of the Canadian Human Rights Act) that requires employers to identify and remove barriers that have an adverse impact on employees protected under the Act and to implement measures necessary to allow these employees to perform their duties to the best of their abilities.”

Federal public service

Refers to the core public administration (departments and agencies named in Schedules I and IV of FAA, for which the Treasury Board Secretariat is the employer) and separate agencies (organizations named in Schedule V of the FAA).

Accessibility, Accommodation and Adaptive Computer Technology Program

The Accessibility, Accommodation and Adaptive Computer Technology (AAACT) Program offers public servants with disabilities a wide range of adaptive computer technologies, tools, training, services, and resources. The goal of the AAACT program is to help the public service support departments who offer programs and services to Canadians and to build accessible workplaces with equal opportunities for all employees.

2. Consultations

For this progress report, the IDEA team consulted with all employees through our Annual Accessibility Survey. The online survey focused on measuring our progress across the seven accessibility priorities of the Accessible Canada Act (ACA). We gathered feedback on various aspects of employees’ working environments and experiences as they relate to accessibility and accessibility barriers. Our Accessibility Implementation Working Group (AIWG) is using survey findings to help guide their work, and the survey results were used for the planning and development of our Accessibility Plan 2026-2028.

We received 538 responses, for a response rate of 43%. This is a 6% increase from last year’s survey responses. Of those responding, 1 in 5 (21%) disclosed they had a disability. We noted that 57% of employees with disabilities requested accommodations, which is an increase from 47% in 2024.

Feedback from our employees is essential to help us continue to identify, address, and prevent barriers in our workplace.

Respondents identified the following barriers:

• Lack of or limited awareness of accessibility processes, roles and responsibilities, tools, and resources across many of the priority areas
• Lack of awareness of invisible disabilities
• Training gaps
• Some employees with disabilities reported discomfort in disclosing disabilities, for fear of negative career impacts and indicated stigma as a barrier to requesting accommodations.
• Sensory issues experienced in our physical office environment and a lack of options or support to mitigate them

Additionally, we consulted with the priority leads of OSFI’s Accessibility Implementation Working Group (AIWG) and division heads to confirm progress on the actions as they are the subject matter experts in those areas.

3. Priority areas

The seven priority areas described under section 5 of the ACA include:

• employment
• built environment
• information and communication technologies (ICT)
• communication, other than ICT
• procurement of goods, services, and facilities
• design and delivery of programs and services
• transportation

The AIWG was consulted on progress made for each of the ACA priority areas and actions identified in our previous Accessibility Plan. A few new barriers were identified as part of our annual accessibility survey. We will continue to make progress on the work we have already started on the previous accessibility plan.

4. Our progress

Our 2023-2026 Accessibility Plan originally had 16 actions; through consultations for our annual Accessibility Progress Report, we added 10 actions, for a total of 26 actions. The timeline for these actions was short-term (within 1 year), medium-term (1-3 years), and long-term (required more than 3 years to complete).

We will briefly summarize the progress made prior to 2025. For a full list of OSFI’s progress, please find the 2023 and 2024 progress reports on our external website.

4.1 Employment

In 2025, OSFI accomplished the following:

• Increased the representation of employees with disabilities from 9.3% to 10.2%.
• Launched a new intranet page on the Duty to Accommodate. The site incorporates the general accommodation process, a quick 3-step process to request accommodations for managers and employees, lists, tools and resources and clarifies roles and responsibilities.
• Celebrated AccessAbility Week 2025 by hosting an OSFI-wide learning event featuring a guest speaker with significant expertise in embedding accessibility into organizations. This event was in collaboration between OSFI’s Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility team and its Inclusion Network mental health and accessibility stream. The speaker shared powerful insights on accessibility barriers in the workplace. This helped to improve a culture of inclusion and accessibility at OSFI.
• Leveraged our Annual Accessibility Survey to assess the current state against all priority areas, progress report, and identify where more work is required.
• Continued the implementation of the Biases and Barriers checklist with hiring managers during the staffing process. Our staffing advisors work with hiring managers to identify potential biases and barriers and ways to mitigate them. To support candidates who identify as persons with disabilities, we provide opportunities throughout the staffing process to request an accommodation. If a candidate makes us aware of an accessibility barrier related to assessment, we provide options such as in-person, by audio only, by audio and video, pre-recorded if available, and varied assessment duration.
• Outreached and increased internal engagement activities to raise awareness of our Accessibility Plan and barriers in our workplace.

4.2 Built Environment

In 2025, OSFI accomplished the following:

• Addressed barriers linked to unassigned seating and improved the accessibility of office spaces within the hybrid work environment. The 2025 annual accessibility survey did not indicate any concerns or barriers linked to unassigned seating.
• Launched the Duty to Accommodate process, which increased the transparency for employees on the steps they can take to receive accommodation.
• Continued to offer ergonomic assessments upon employee requests. Communication and process were shared on the intranet to improve workplace knowledge of ergonomic assessments for all OSFI employees.
• Conducted consultations with employees with disabilities via the Annual Accessibility Survey to improve awareness of employees’ needs related to OSFI's physical office locations and the accessibility barriers that exist.
• Continued to promote mandatory annual building evacuation training to all employees to ensure safe, long-term evacuation solutions for all employees. The 2025 Accessibility survey results indicated a need to raise more awareness and communicate the roles and responsibilities of floor wardens more. Communicated with the Person Requiring Assistance (PRA) process and encouraged staff to contact security services to disclose needs in the event of an evacuation.

4.3 Information and communications technologies (ICT)

In 2025, OSFI accomplished the following:

• Commenced work on a new proposed employee portal called ServiceNow, which can provide a single accessibility catalogue for all users. This tool, when launched, will help increase familiarity with the accessibility tools and resources employees can access.
• Hosted Digital Edge Sessions related to Accessibility.
• Hosted a Booster Tip session to increase awareness on making events more accessible, including access to language interpretation.
• Supported increasing clarity on how to submit accessibility requests to IT. Turnaround times for requests were improved through Shared Services Canada’s streamlined process identification that allows OSFI’s IM/IT to leverage for the acquisition of accessible hardware under $5k. This eliminated the need to go through Shared Services Canada and AAACT.

• Incorporated tips and best practices to increase accessibility in its Digital Booster article series published on OSFI’s intranet, and during learning sessions in 2023-2024. This initiative has helped foster a culture of growth, inclusion, and continuous learning.

4.4 Communications other than ICT

In 2025, OSFI accomplished the following:

• Published the OSFI style guide to help standardize writing style across OSFI business products to make information more readable and accessible. The Style Guide is a comprehensive resource designed to support employees when drafting documents. The guide focuses on standardizing writing, editing, and formatting practices and covers various communication topics.
• Created an Accessibility Landing page on OSFI’s intranet.
• Held discussions on the use of OSFI’s Style Guide and will provide training to employees in 2026
• Created an Accessibility Communications Plan with the internal goals of raising employee awareness and engagement, promoting accessibility initiatives and supporting day-to-day sharing of information, connection, and collaboration between employees.

4.5 The procurement of goods, services, and facilities

In 2025, OSFI reviewed the statements of work template to ensure it is accessible.

4.6 The design and delivery of programs and services

In 2025, OSFI developed a process for external stakeholders to request accommodation or accessible materials from OSFI.

4.7 Transportation

In 2025, OSFI improved our website Contact section to make it easier for individuals to identify possible parking options near OSFI offices.

5. Reporting and implementation

This Accessibility Plan Progress Report is an important step for OSFI to create a more accessible workplace, but it cannot stand alone. Throughout this progress report and in our new Accessibility plan 2026-2028, we have highlighted our commitment to addressing barriers within our organization to become barrier-free for persons with disabilities. We are dedicated to acting on these commitments.

The Accessible Canada Act mandates that annual progress reports be published to track progress on the implementation of the actions described in OSFI’s Accessibility Plan. OSFI is excited to continue to implement these actions.

OSFI continues to build accountability and engagement in the implementation of our Accessibility Plan through its Accessibility Implementation Working Group, sponsored by a senior executive. This working group is responsible for our accessibility commitments and for leading progress against actions in our Plan. It is also responsible for reporting on OSFI’s progress through our formal governance structure.

In consultation with persons with disabilities, we will continue to proactively identify barriers to accessibility within our organization and strive to eliminate them. We remain committed to addressing these barriers and creating an organization that is inclusive of all.

6. Feedback

OSFI welcomes feedback on accessibility, especially from persons with disabilities. We have established the following process for receiving and actioning feedback related to accessibility. Feedback related to barriers to accessibility at OSFI or the implementation of OSFI’s Accessibility Plan can be directed to:

Email address: accessible@osfi-bsif.gc.ca

Mail:
Accessibility Program Lead
255 Albert Street, 12th Floor
Ottawa, ON K1A 0H2
Canada
Telephone number: 1-800-385-8647
TTY: 1-800-465-7735
Fax: 613-990-5591

Feedback can be submitted anonymously or with personal information identified.

All feedback will be acknowledged through the same means by which it was received, unless it was received anonymously.

If the feedback was not submitted anonymously, it will be acknowledged through the same means it was received within 15 business days.

The feedback will be taken into consideration by the Human Resources division. It will then be forwarded to relevant divisions when necessary.

If the feedback includes contact information, any immediate action resulting from the feedback will be communicated to the person who submitted the feedback. All feedback related to accessibility will be captured in a central location for analysis and recordkeeping. Feedback will be used to help identify, prevent, and remove barriers in a timely manner.

OSFI has prioritized feedback from our employees to help make this progress report relevant and actionable. We have used feedback to identify new accessibility barriers and ways we can become more inclusive. The feedback we have collected this year has been reflected in the priority area sections of this progress report. In these sections, we have identified new barriers and ways we will address these barriers moving forward. OSFI has provided a detailed summary of the way we consulted employees in the Consultations section of this report.