WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

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Re: Cost of Web accessibility, yet again

for

From: julian.rickards
Date: Oct 5, 2004 2:32PM

As you said, a mechanic cannot provide an estimate before examining your
car, you can't provide an estimate before you examine their site. However,
recognize that many mechanics will do a very cursory report on the state of
your piece of junk (sorry, thinking of my car at the moment) and produce
just a starting estimate for the work. How many times have you gone in to
get the brake pads changed to be told that your rotors need grinding and
your brake lines are leaking. You could do a cursory audit for free or a
detailed audit for a price.

I personally would recommend that you state the two options and price out
the full audit (as best you can) and then as one aspect of the audit report,
provide an estimate of what it will take to make the site accessible. If you
price the audit and rebuild separately, you can then get paid for the audit,
whether or not they go for the rebuild. You could offer a discount on the
audit if they go for the rebuild as an incentive but that is your call.

Secondly, as you may have seen recently, a number of big name sites have
been reworked to use current standard code such as ESPN and Yahoo!.
Recently, Zeldman (Happy Cog) did a rebuild of the Kansas City Chiefs
website which also involved a bit of a redesign too. Your client may not
want just a rebuild but also a redesign which would entail more time (money)
and effort (money). Therefore, you must spend more time and effort working
out the details of the rebuild so that a rebuild does not turn into a
redesign (without your consent) or that you are properly paid for the
rebuild and redesign.

Just my 2 cents,

Jules

-----------------------------------------------
Julian Rickards
A/Digital Publications Distribution Coordinator
Publication Services Section,
Ministry of Northern Development and Mines,
Vox: 705-670-5608 / Fax: 705-670-5960