Your website should be accessible to everyone.
We will guide to you stay in legal compliance with complex ADA laws.
Schedule a FREE Assessment
We will guide to you stay in legal compliance with complex ADA laws.
Schedule a FREE Assessment 
The Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA") was signed into law in 1990. This act prohibits discrimination "on the basis of disability in the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations offered by businesses."
You may be more familiar with ADA requirements with improvements such as wheelchair accessiblity or braille menus in retaurants. Because your website and digital communication are an extention of your business, as of January 2017, compliance needed there as well.
The more research we do on the matter of ADA compliance related lawsuits, the more we are blown away on the magnitude of this issue facing businesses today. Here is a news story from Fox Buisness that does a great job of explaining the current landscape.
The ADA was passed well before the Internet was what it is today. However, U.S. Department Justice ("DOJ") has taken the position that the ADA applies to websites, and that to avoid illegal discrimination a website must be designed to be accessible through and compatible with electronic screen reader technology commonly used by blind and visually impaired persons.
The DOJ and many well-known advocacy organizations take the position that to be accessible a website must comply with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1). An update to the law was expected in 2018 but has been put on "inactive" status by the US government at the moment (no one is really sure what this means). However, the absence of formal regulations has not stopped the DOJ or plaintiff law firms from initiating litigation, and multiple courts have found that the ADA applies to websites even without formal regulations.
Well, yes and no. The actual law is worded to reflect government agenices and government vendors, however law firms have taken private businesses to court over their websites and digital communications accessiblity - and are now winning cases.
Before, June of 2018, the "measuring stick" for accessibility was WCAG 2.0 (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines). In June the W3C released WCAG 2.1, which included compliance for not only blind users, but thise wuth low vision, learning disabilities, speech disabilities and multiple other disabilities. Maintaining accessiblity is something that should be looked at on-going in your business, but the first step is becoming compliant with current standards.
Ensuring that you have done all you can to abide by the ADA laws and regulations, is important for 2 reasons: access to more customers and potential avoidance of lawsuits.
Approximately 40 million Americans suffer from a disablity.
That's 12.6% of the population! If those people are unable to access your website's content properly, that's big portion of the population that won't be doing buisness with you.
A simple Google search brings up more litigation cases than imaginable. This news story explains the needs from the perspective of those that are disabled.
How would being sued in court for ADA non-compliance affect your business?
Is this really happening? It is indeed, and it's growing. In 2017, 814 Website Accessiblity lawsuits were filed in the US. In just the first 6 months of 2018, there have been over 1053 lawsuits filed! The first major "win" for the accessiblity compliance cases came last year when food chain Winn Dixie was found guilty of not having their website accessible to those with disabilities. They were required to bring their digital communication up to compliance in addition to paying all the legal fees in excess of $100,000.
We are NAMTRA media, a digital agency that has been helping our clients with their web needs for the last 21 years. We understand what it takes to become ADA compliant, where the work-arounds are and how to create a highly accessibile site that is still asthetically pleasing to all users.
Want to know if you meet the Federal ADA compliance requirements?
Complete this form to schedule a FREE 20-minute, no-obligation call. Whether you need our help or not, it's good to know where you stand.
