Are You Concerned About Your Website Meeting ADA Accessibility Guidelines?
February 19, 2019 / by Diane Callihan
Importance of ADA Compliant Websites
In November of 2017, we published a blog post about the importance of restaurants having ADA compliant websites because more and more restaurants were being sued for not being accessible to people with disabilities.
Now, just this past month, a local news station here in Tampa ran a story about how the number of web accessibility lawsuits are skyrocketing. And they aren’t just being filed against restaurants, but against businesses of all kinds.
According to UsableNet, there were 2,285 ADA website lawsuits filed in federal courts across the nation in 2018, an increase of a 181% over the previous year - the majority of which originate in New York and right here in Florida.
One visually-impaired woman in Broward County has filed over 175 ADA lawsuits.
While it’s important that businesses make their websites easily accessible to all people, the lawsuits are often punishing those who simply did not know about ADA web compliance and hurting small businesses who may not be able to afford the settlement fees, litigation or the expense of redoing their websites.
Many people are saying that it would be better to raise awareness about this issue by educating businesses about the standards instead of suing them.
Historically, the majority of these lawsuits have been against restaurants, but with a growing number people filing suits, all kinds of businesses are being impacted.
Here at Roger West, we’ve seen this issue become increasingly important to our clients, so we’ve put together comprehensive Web Accessibility Audit to determine your business’ level of risk and can subsequently put an action plan together to get your website on the path to compliance.
Additionally, once your site meets compliance standards, ongoing audits and employee training should take place to ensure your site stays in compliance.
We also recommend that when businesses build new sites, they build them to meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines from the get-go. This can be less expensive in the long run than reprogramming an existing site.
If you’re concerned about whether your site is compliant, we’d be happy to help. Let’s Talk.
Diane Callihan
With more than 20 years of experience writing for some of the country’s top brands, Diane helped to shape Roger West’s content strategy, lead generation, and PR efforts as Director of Marketing. She currently serves as President of Callihan Content Creation.