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Re: Accessibility Reports for acquisition managers?

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From: Andrews, David B (DEED)
Date: Jan 19, 2018 10:32AM

As others have said, the only thing out there is a VPAT. Also, since it is "self-reporting," they always aren't accurate. The person filling out the VPAT may not understand what is being asked, and may not give inaccurate information.

I think the VPAT is an indicator of accessibility awareness, but it can't be trusted as a guarantee of accessibility.

There is no quick answer to your question, at some point you will have to get your hands, and ears dirty.

If the purchase is large enough, in terms of value, you could reasonably ask for an independent third party audit. Make sure the audit goes directly to you though, so it can't be edited.

Dave



David Andrews | Chief Technology Officer
Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development
State Services for the Blind
2200 University Ave West, Suite 240, St. Paul MN 55114
Direct: 651-539-2294
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-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Brandon Keith Biggs
Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2018 12:06 PM
To: WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
Subject: [WebAIM] Accessibility Reports for acquisition managers?

Hello,
I'm wondering if there is any kind of report or scoring mechanism other than WCAG As I can ask vendors to provide me while searching for software to purchace for our company?
I'm wasting a whole lot of time reviewing interfaces that are not accessible in critical ways with my screen reader and I would like to just ask for an accessibility report that says "This company has reviewed their web interface and it is n level of accessible" or something like that?
I'm thinking of just requiring all our software to be WCAG AA before I will look at it, but I don't think it is easy to rank a website as WCAG AA or AAA.
Especially for elastic markets for software like PSAs, HR, timekeeping, CRMs, password safes, cloud storage, accounting, and stuff like that, I would like a way to just canvas as many companies as possible and ask them for an accessibility report, then I can look at the ones who actually respond. I don't want to spend hours going through an accounting software just to find that the reports screen is not accessible.
Is there anything like this?
Thank you,