Although the European Accessibility Act (EEA) is primarily aimed at improving the online experience of residents in the European Union (EU), UK businesses are still affected if they do business within the EU. The Act has extra-territorial reach, meaning if you sell services or goods online within the EU, you will need to comply with the EEA. The deadline for compliance is the 28th June 2025.
Websites, apps and digital content platforms are all affected, meaning you will need to take steps to ensure compliance if you serve consumers in the EU. The EEA is not becoming part of UK law, but must still be adhered to if any of your audience is in the EU—much like the way GDPR must be adhered to globally to protect the privacy of users from the EU and UK if they fall within the target audience.
What is Accessibility?
Around 16% of the world’s population experiences a disability,1 a market deeply underserved online who encounter many struggles not only accessing sites and apps, but interpreting context and successfully performing online tasks.
Accessibility refers to designing and developing online experiences that all people, regardless of their abilities or disabilities, can perceive, understand, navigate, and interact with, removing barriers that might prevent them from having an equal online experience.
The EEA aims to improve digital accessibility, putting into law principles and guidelines to ensure that goods and services aimed at EU consumers can be accessed by all. This builds on accessibility recommendations long-held by the digital industry to ensure an equitable web for everyone.
How to Comply with EEA Legislation
Accessibility Guidelines
The EEA is based on Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 Level AA, which recommends accessibility features and protocols that any well-considered website should already be aspiring to achieve. Recommendations include:
- Providing text alternatives for non-text content (e.g., image alt text).
- Ensuring keyboard-only navigation is possible.
- Making your website usable with screen readers.
- Implementing proper color contrast.
- Allowing text to be resized.
- Creating properly tagged PDF documents.
- Using clear and simple language.
- Avoiding flashing or distracting elements.
- Using ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) roles, states, and properties.
Accessibility Statement
An accessibility statement is a document published on your website that communicates your commitment to accessibility and details your current accessibility status. It’s a transparent declaration to users, especially those with disabilities, about how the website aims to be inclusive and what steps are being taken to achieve that.
You’ll need to perform an accessibility audit of your website and report your findings, remediating what you can, and documenting what is still outstanding.
Following this, a good starting point for creating your accessibility statement is the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)’s statement generator.
Regular Review
Following the initial audit and the addition of a statement to your website, you will need to regularly review your digital services to ensure they remain accessible. Additions and improvements should be carried out with accessibility in mind, ensuring compliance.
When Do I Need to Comply with the EEA?
The EAA comes into full effect on 28th June 2025, which is the critical date for all new products and services placed on the EU market.
However, the EAA includes a five-year transitional period specifically for pre-existing services and contracts, recognising the burden of assessment and compliance on organisations. Therefore providers of pre-existing services and related digital content actually have until 28th June 2030 to bring their websites and apps into full compliance with the EAA’s accessibility requirements.
The transitional period is designed to give businesses a reasonable amount of time to assess their existing digital assets, plan for necessary changes, and implement accessibility improvements without disruption. It acknowledges that retrofitting accessibility into established systems can be complex and time-consuming.
It’s crucial to note that if an existing service or platform undergoes a significant modification or update before the 28th June 2030 deadline, it may trigger an earlier compliance obligation for the modified parts. This encourages businesses to build accessibility into any updates or new features they introduce.
Exemptions
Microenterprises
Microenterprises—organisations with fewer than 10 employees AND less than €2 million turnover—are excluded from the EAA’s requirements for services. However, this exclusion does not apply to covered products, such as computers and machines.
Despite exemption, microenterprises should still consider the benefits of compliance, or at least starting their journey to compliance, as there are many other benefits to having a robust understanding and application of accessibility guidance in their digital presence:
- Wider Customer Base: Making your services accessible to those with disabilities broadens your market share.
- Improved User Experience: Accessibility features can benefit all users, not just those with disabilities (e.g., clear navigation, good colour contrast, readable text).
- Reputation: Demonstrating commitment to inclusivity enhances your brand’s image and social responsibility.
- Future-proofing: Accessibility legislation is evolving, and it’s likely that exemptions may be reduced over time.
- UK Equality Act 2010: The UK’s Equality Act 2010 still requires service providers to make “reasonable adjustments” for disabled users.
Note that the burden for compliance must be assessed regularly—if you experience growth and your employee numbers or turnover exceed the exemption threshold, the EEA will become applicable to your business.
Other Exemptions
The EAA also has a “disproportionate burden” clause. This allows any businesses, not just those qualifying as a microenterprise, to claim an exemption from specific accessibility requirements if fulfilling them would impose an undue hardship. However, this is a high bar to meet, requires thorough documentation and justification, and doesn’t exempt the business from the EAA entirely.
Summary
The EEA is an important step on the road to ensuring an accessible web for all, but you may not need to take action just yet:
- Not applicable to microenterprises with less than 10 employees AND less than €2M turnover.
- Five-year transition period for pre-existing goods and services on the EU market.
- If you are in the UK, but do not serve the EU, you still need to adhere to the UK Equality Act 2010.
- If you are likely to experience growth or may expand into the EU market in the future, aiming for EEA compliance is a good idea and it is recommended to start your compliance journey as soon as possible to future-proof your business.
If you believe that the EEA is already applicable to your business—i.e. you provide goods and services to the EU and you have more than 10 employees and/or a turnover of more than €2M—then start working towards compliance now:
- Carry out an accessibility audit;
- Take steps to remediate aspects that do not comply;
- Add an accessibility statement to your website, and;
- Consider accessibility in all of your future development.
Ballyhoo is here to help. We already build our websites with accessibility in mind and can assist in the audit, remediation and planning process. Call us on 0121 295 5352 or drop and email to [email protected] to discuss your requirements.
