WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: WCAG certifications, are there any official requirements to certify a website?

for

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Nov 10, 2011 8:21AM

Hi

I totally agree with that, another problem of said company (and I am
sure most companies), is that a certificate is provided at a certain
date, and when it's expired, no one bothers to remove it from their
website.
However, there are regulations in some countries now that require some
sort of web certification, however silly that is really.
I much more respect a company that puts a disclaimer saying it is
aware of accessibility issues, and has a dedicated accessibility
contact email, one which is actually monitorred. ;)
Cheers
-B

On 11/9/11, Lucy Greco < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> As a screen reader user I don't thing surts are worth the bits they are
> written with. Because as we all know web sites are not static and a surt
> is. And what is a surt any way but a pat on the back of a person wanting a
> surt.
>
> Lucy Greco
> Assistive Technology Specialist
> Disabled Student's Program UC Berkeley
> (510) 643-7591
> http://attlc.berkeley.edu
> http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Birkir R.
> Gunnarsson
> Sent: Wednesday, November 09, 2011 2:17 PM
> To: WebAIM Discussion List
> Subject: [WebAIM] WCAG certifications, are there any official requirements
> to certify a website?
>
> Hi everyone
>
> I know this has been brought up before, but I am wondering if there
> have been changes.
> In Iceland we have one company that has issued accessibility
> certifications for websites.
> Their certification scheme and requirements have not been updated
> since 2006 or so, and are still based on WCAG 1.0, with a few
> additional requirements that I don't necessarily agree with (websites
> need to offer users 3 font size configurations, and at the top of
> every page there has to be a link to the page's search field, if there
> is one).
> I've been asked to provide certification info for a company that
> intends on providing web services across Europe, and are wondering if
> there are international certification standards that it can use to
> show accessibility (they're willing to do what needs to be done to be
> compliant).
> In the U.S. I'd point to Section 508 requirements, but in Europe the
> Mandate 376 is still under development, and most countries have a
> variation on the WCAG 2.0 level A or AA compliance, sometimes with
> additions.
> I can run an accessibility check for WCAG AA, there are a few out
> there, but could a page be certified with any errors under that check?
> I know most very navigable websites have may be up to 10 WCAG 2.0
> errors from an automatic checker, and there are very workable and
> accessible solutions that do not necessarily pass automatic WCAG 2.0
> checks (many examples of the creative use of WAI ARIA lately, that I
> feel do more for making a site accessible, than checking of WCAG
> requirements).
> So, this being said, are there any international certification
> criteria for, say, WCAG 2.0 compliance, and is there any mechanism
> around that?
> I would assume that, no, a company would have to be certified under
> the accessibility regulation of each country it provides sservices in.
>
> Similarly, are there any programs to qualify someone as an
> accessibility/WCAG tester?
> I've never heard of one, so I assume no, but any certification in the
> area might be a very useful thing.
> Thanks
> -B
>