ADA Website Compliance Checklist Catherine Taylor

ADA WEBSITE COMPLIANCE CHECKLIST

BY CATHERINE TAYLOR – MAR Associate Counsel

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires that businesses make both their physical space and their online space accessible to individuals with disabilities. Denial of full and equal access to website content, and real estate services as a result, may also be a Fair Housing violation. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines provides a detailed breakdown of the steps that can be taken to make online content more accessible to people with disabilities, including auditory, cognitive, neurological, physical, speech and visual. If you are uncertain whether your website is in compliance, check with your web developer.

COMPLIANCE TIPS

Website

■ Images Include alternate (alt) text for images ■ Use text rather than an image of text (except logos) ■ Do not rely on screen orientation

Audio & Video

■ Include subtitles, captions, and/or written transcripts ■ Allow auto-play of sound or video to be paused ■ Do not have videos flash more than 3 times/second

Colors

■ Use high contrast between text and background colors ■ Do not use color as the only prompt to convey info.

Fillable Forms

■ Include labels immediately next to fillable field(s).

Text

■ Ensure that text can be enlarged without distortion ■ Do not use images of text (except logos) ■ Each page should have a language assigned

Links

■ Links should describe where the link is going ■ State type of document linked to and size (DOC/PDF)

Navigation

■ Allow website to be navigated using the keyboard only ■ Provide multiple ways to find information ■ Do not use site time limits ■ Individual pages should have unique titles