Design Domination Podcast Episode #187: How to Create an Accessibility Statement

Music: https://www.bensound.com

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I want to start off by saying I’m not a lawyer, so none of this is legal advice.

Purpose of an Accessibility Statement

Let’s talk first about what is an accessibility statement.

An accessibility statement lets website users know an organization’s overall position about accessibility and the state of their website.

Some accessibility lawyers, such as Lainey Feingold and Kris Rivenburgh, have said in the past that an accessibility statement is good practice and may help ward off lawsuits.

Lainey Feingold said on her website:

I believe that posted accessibility pages help organizations avoid legal action — so long as there is an active phone number and email address and site visitors get prompt and positive responses to feedback.

The other purpose of an accessibility statement is to express an organization’s commitment to accessibility and to show website users they care about accessibility and the users who need it.

What an accessibility statement is not is a promise that everything is going to be perfectly accessible to everyone and at all times. So don’t think you have to first make a website accessible to put up an accessibility statement.

Run, don’t walk. Do it now!

What to Include in an Accessibility Statement

So what should an accessibility statement say?

Again, I am not a lawyer, and some organizations may need to have certain elements included in an accessibility statement.

But generally speaking, an accessibility statement usually:

• talks about the organization’s commitment to accessibility;
• states the level of WCAG conformance the organization is aiming for, such as WCAG 2.2 AA;
• notes any accessibility or browser-related issues that have been identified and if those issues are in the process of being fixed;
• says what the organization is doing to ensure ongoing accessibility, such as doing periodic automated checks, annual audits or user testing; and
• contact information for the individual or department that will handle any issues that users report.

The accessibility statement should be updated as needed. For example, for organizations I’ve done audits for, I usually tell them to update their accessibility statement to state they had an audit done and when, which conformance level and any extra steps that may have been taken as well as to have it reviewed by their lawyer.

Speaking of lawyers, we know they love legalese. But the accessibility statement should be easy for users to understand. So it should be written in simple language, not legalese and necessarily getting into various technical WCAG information.

I mean, if the guidelines make your eyes glaze over, how do you think the everyday non-technical user would feel?

Where to Include an Accessibility Statement

So then where do you put an accessibility statement? Typically, it’s on its own page, not buried in the content of another page, such as a privacy policy or other page.

It should be easy to find on the website. Usually, you will find an accessibility statement in a link in the footer of a website.

Examples of Accessibility Statements

Let’s take a look at some examples of website accessibility statements. I am not suggesting you model these or anything, but let’s just take a look at what they each include.

European Union

The European Union website links to their accessibility statement in the footer in a section called “Legal.” The accessibility statement starts by mentioning that it applies only to this domain.

It then talks about what users should be able to do on the website. It mentions the law and level of WCAG conformance, compliance status (partial) and date it was last tested, how to contact them, compatibility with browsers and assistive technology, and a list of accessibility issues they have identified and are working to fix and when they plan to have fixed some of them.

Town of Ocean City, Maryland

Let’s look the Town of Ocean City, Maryland website. The accessibility statement is easily found in the footer.

So let’s see what it says. They start off by saying, “If you use assistive technology (such as a Braille reader, or a screen reader) and the format of any material on this website interferes with your ability to access information, please contact us.”

But what about sighted keyboard users? They don’t necessarily use assistive technology.

OK, then they state the law, Section 508, and the level of conformance they’re aiming for—WCAG 2.0 AA.

They list built-in browser accessibility tools. I would think that someone who needs one of them, though, would already be using that or assistive technology or something with their operating system. But OK.

Then they say that Adobe Reader (that should say Adobe Acrobat Reader) is needed to read their PDFs and where to download it, and, finally a list of supported assistive technology—screen readers—and keyboard navigation.

That is interesting about keyboard navigation, because the website skip link doesn’t work, so sighted keyboard users have to tab through the entire menu and all the way down the page. Not only that but they cannot see where they are on the page, because the focus state has been removed.

I’ve contacted them about this and told them how to fix it, so maybe it will get fixed soon.

Black and Decker

Let’s take a look at the website of a big company, Black and Decker. Their accessibility statement is also easy to find, in the footer. It talks about their commitment, level of conformance, how they are ensuring accessibility and contact information.

Lainey Feingold

Now let’s see what Lainey Feingold does on her site. Her accessibility statement talks about the site meeting WCAG 2.2 AAA, other than some pages do not meet the AAA reading requirement, the ongoing efforts to ensure accessibility she has made over time.

Resources for Writing an Accessibility Statement

Writing an accessibility statement isn’t hard, and you don’t have to start from scratch. You’ll just need to ask your clients a few questions first.

There are some resources to help you create an accessibility statement, although you might want to have a lawyer review it at some point.

Some of the resources are:

• Equalize Digital’s Accessibility Checker plugin for WordPress (this is an affiliate link, so if you buy the Pro version of the plugin, I will make a few bucks).
• W3C’s accessibility statement generator
• Gov.uk
• SiteImprove

So that sums up an accessibility statement. If this was helpful, please help me out by giving this a like and share, and, of course, subscribe so you get notified of new content.