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Number of posts in this thread: 6 (In chronological order)

From: AutoMagicMike
Date: Sat, May 18 2013 10:20AM
Subject: Local legislation or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) ?
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Hi everyone,

I'm a little confused about the differences between accessibility
legislation
in different countries around the globe. Any clarification would be really
helpful.

I regularly have to develop for UK, Europe, US and other countries.

I have always been told to completely "ignore" local legislation for any
individual country as it is too time consuming and time can be better spend
else where.

I was told to focus on "usability", the Web Content Accessibility
Guidelines (WCAG2) and clean valid HTML, in that order of importance.

Usability ...

I've been told that "usability" is the primary objective of any website,
and that
includes usability for people with disabilities, which is why all our
developers
should test their pages with a screen reader (e.g. NonVisual Desktop Access
NVDA).
Ultimately there is no substitute for usability testing - "Don’t make me
think!"

Many web developers, (project leaders and product managers), cannot use a
screen reader.
The skill should not be beyond most able bodied web developers and business
users who are often involved in web work.
Using a screen reader regularly, like validating regularly, improves the
quality of your work.
Use of screen readers also puts an end to those endless, is "x" better
than "y" "discussions".

When your website sounds wrong - that's when to redesigning and turn to the
WCAG and
Roger Hudson's excellent work on accessible forms.
Of course for the less experienced WCAG also provides training and a
framework to get you started writing accessible HTML.

So, once developers have performed the following 3 tasks they should be
ready to go:
1) Validated HTML
2) Checked against an accessibility checker.
e.g. The Web Accessibility Evaluation tool - WAVE?
3) Performed usability tests in a screen reader.

These two questions often come up:
1) What if we have missed a rule?
2) What if it doesn't work on another screen reader or device?

These questions are usually answered along the lines of one of the
following five statements:

1) If you have created clean, valid HTML, which is WCAG web application
compliant
it "should" work on all devices including: Braille displays, pointing
devices and
and magnifiers.

2) You only break the law if someone complains and, you are in breach of
WCAG.
If someone complains - you didn't do your usability testing properly :-)
Complaints are "gifts" from loyal customers - treat them as such.

3) Fines are not "instant", you have a “reasonable” time to engage
with the customer and provide a suitable fix.
Engaging with customers to find out exactly what they want is a good
thing.
This is called "feedback" and it helps create a better service and
increases
customer loyalty.

Developers can't test for all types of users (Novice to Advance) on all
types of devices.
While professional developers do their best, they need to focus on clean
valid HTML
and rely on feed back and comments from users to make our websites better.

4) Companies get fined when they break the guidelines and then refuse to
fix the problem.
- So engage with your customer, and fix the problem!

5) Finally, when companies are taken to court the lawyers focus on
WCAG and W3C guidelines rather than local legislation.
So providing you web offering meets WCAG you should be fine.

In summing up my three questions are:

1) Is this sound advice?
2) If so are there any benefits to country's coming up with their own
slightly different set of guide lines?
3) Can anyone think of an example where following WCAG2 might still lead to
prosecution under local legislation?


Thanks

Mike

From: Steve Green
Date: Sat, May 18 2013 10:52AM
Subject: Re: Local legislation or the Web Content AccessibilityGuidelines (WCAG) ?
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In the UK the applicable law is the Equality Act, which was preceded by the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA). The Equality Act is only concerned with 'actual outcomes' i.e. whether the plaintiff can demonstrate that there is an actual accessibility barrier. WCAG compliance is totally irrelevant.

The absence of a technical standard in the Equality Act makes it difficult to know exactly what you need to do, especially as no case law has been established. Nevertheless, we recommend that our clients do the following:

1. Aim for compliance with WCAG 2.0 level AA.
2. Do as much user testing with disabled participants as they can afford.
3. Produce a roadmap with timescales and costings to get to what they believe will be an acceptable accessibility level.
4. Keep records of all of this so a court can see there is a genuine intention to achieve an acceptable accessibility level.

Furthermore, the plaintiff cannot go directly to court. They must inform you of the problem and give you the opportunity to fix it or provide the information or service by a different means.

So, to answer your questions:

1. Yes, usability is more important than WCAG compliance, although I can't recall any site that did well in user testing that was not at least close to achieving WCAG 2.0 AA. The reverse is not the case though.

2. No, people are the same everywhere. The whole world should adopt UK law.

3. Yes, I have seen plenty of websites that achieved high levels of WCAG compliance but were unusable for some user groups. One example is excessively long pages. We tested a website on which a form was about 20 screens long and contained several hundred form controls. It was marked up perfectly and passed WCAG 2.0 AA, but it was utterly unusable with a screen reader or screen magnifier.

Steve Green
Managing Director
Test Partners Ltd

From: Whitney Quesenbery
Date: Wed, May 22 2013 6:42PM
Subject: Re: Local legislation or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) ?
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Usability is also more than running the site through NVDA if you are not a
regular screen reader user.

It's a good step, but usability is about actual user experience. The ISO
definition is that a site or product is usable if the people for whom it is
intended can use it effectively, efficiently (in an appropriate length of
time), and with satisfaction, to complete appropriate tasks or activities.

W


On Sat, May 18, 2013 at 12:52 PM, Steve Green <
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:

> In the UK the applicable law is the Equality Act, which was preceded by
> the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA). The Equality Act is only concerned
> with 'actual outcomes' i.e. whether the plaintiff can demonstrate that
> there is an actual accessibility barrier. WCAG compliance is totally
> irrelevant.
>
> The absence of a technical standard in the Equality Act makes it difficult
> to know exactly what you need to do, especially as no case law has been
> established. Nevertheless, we recommend that our clients do the following:
>
> 1. Aim for compliance with WCAG 2.0 level AA.
> 2. Do as much user testing with disabled participants as they can afford.
> 3. Produce a roadmap with timescales and costings to get to what they
> believe will be an acceptable accessibility level.
> 4. Keep records of all of this so a court can see there is a genuine
> intention to achieve an acceptable accessibility level.
>
> Furthermore, the plaintiff cannot go directly to court. They must inform
> you of the problem and give you the opportunity to fix it or provide the
> information or service by a different means.
>
> So, to answer your questions:
>
> 1. Yes, usability is more important than WCAG compliance, although I can't
> recall any site that did well in user testing that was not at least close
> to achieving WCAG 2.0 AA. The reverse is not the case though.
>
> 2. No, people are the same everywhere. The whole world should adopt UK law.
>
> 3. Yes, I have seen plenty of websites that achieved high levels of WCAG
> compliance but were unusable for some user groups. One example is
> excessively long pages. We tested a website on which a form was about 20
> screens long and contained several hundred form controls. It was marked up
> perfectly and passed WCAG 2.0 AA, but it was utterly unusable with a screen
> reader or screen magnifier.
>
> Steve Green
> Managing Director
> Test Partners Ltd
>
>

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Thu, May 23 2013 9:35AM
Subject: Re: Local legislation or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) ?
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Hi

Adding a few notes to this conversation:
Lainey Feingold, that very fine lady, is collecting links to
accessibility legislations around the world. The page can be found at:
http://lflegal.com/2013/05/gaad-legal/
Last time I checked it had the usual suspects, U.sS., Canada, UK, but
I believe I can help add the Scandinavian regulations and I am
checking with some European colleagues to try and add more.
If we can build a resonably simple online database this would be very
helpful for those who want to at least have an idea of the legal
requirements around the world.
Also, re WCAG being sufficient, keep in mind that many countries,
especially in Europe, are now adding PDF accessibility to regulations,
and WCAG, strictly speaking, tdoes not cover electronic documents, the
American CVAA covers multimedia files specifically, so you have to be
aware of the most relevant regulations for material that is not
strictly web-based .. documents, multimedia files, identification
systems, social media (to some extent) and mobile applications.
Good post though, I have definitely added this to my favorites,
because I think your approach is very well thought out and sensible.
Cheers
-B


On 5/22/13, Whitney Quesenbery < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Usability is also more than running the site through NVDA if you are not a
> regular screen reader user.
>
> It's a good step, but usability is about actual user experience. The ISO
> definition is that a site or product is usable if the people for whom it is
> intended can use it effectively, efficiently (in an appropriate length of
> time), and with satisfaction, to complete appropriate tasks or activities.
>
> W
>
>
> On Sat, May 18, 2013 at 12:52 PM, Steve Green <
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
>
>> In the UK the applicable law is the Equality Act, which was preceded by
>> the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA). The Equality Act is only
>> concerned
>> with 'actual outcomes' i.e. whether the plaintiff can demonstrate that
>> there is an actual accessibility barrier. WCAG compliance is totally
>> irrelevant.
>>
>> The absence of a technical standard in the Equality Act makes it
>> difficult
>> to know exactly what you need to do, especially as no case law has been
>> established. Nevertheless, we recommend that our clients do the
>> following:
>>
>> 1. Aim for compliance with WCAG 2.0 level AA.
>> 2. Do as much user testing with disabled participants as they can afford.
>> 3. Produce a roadmap with timescales and costings to get to what they
>> believe will be an acceptable accessibility level.
>> 4. Keep records of all of this so a court can see there is a genuine
>> intention to achieve an acceptable accessibility level.
>>
>> Furthermore, the plaintiff cannot go directly to court. They must inform
>> you of the problem and give you the opportunity to fix it or provide the
>> information or service by a different means.
>>
>> So, to answer your questions:
>>
>> 1. Yes, usability is more important than WCAG compliance, although I
>> can't
>> recall any site that did well in user testing that was not at least close
>> to achieving WCAG 2.0 AA. The reverse is not the case though.
>>
>> 2. No, people are the same everywhere. The whole world should adopt UK
>> law.
>>
>> 3. Yes, I have seen plenty of websites that achieved high levels of WCAG
>> compliance but were unusable for some user groups. One example is
>> excessively long pages. We tested a website on which a form was about 20
>> screens long and contained several hundred form controls. It was marked
>> up
>> perfectly and passed WCAG 2.0 AA, but it was utterly unusable with a
>> screen
>> reader or screen magnifier.
>>
>> Steve Green
>> Managing Director
>> Test Partners Ltd
>>
>>

From: Greg Gamble
Date: Thu, May 23 2013 12:57PM
Subject: Re: Local legislation or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) ?
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Don't know if this list has been mentioned ... seems kind of old, but there's a lot of it.
http://www.standards-schmandards.com/projects/government-guidelines/

Also interesting is the Fang's Firefox plugin.

Greg Gamble

From: Karen Mardahl
Date: Thu, May 23 2013 1:30PM
Subject: Re: Local legislation or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) ?
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Hi

Greg Gamble shared a list of government guidelines:
http://www.standards-schmandards.com/projects/government-guidelines/

I can confirm that it is old as he suspected, at least for the Danish info.
Those links are out of date.

Inspired by Birkir R. Gunnarsson's mention of Lainey Feingold's collection
of links to accessibility legislations around the world and her lack of
Danish info, I submitted updated info on her contact form.
It should show up at some point at http://lflegal.com/2013/05/gaad-legal/

Birkir - considering your own collection efforts, I'll mail that same info
to you offlist.

Cheers!

Karen Mardahl