The number of businesses being sued over their website not being compliant has skyrocketed!
There were over 4,000 lawsuits in 2018 and we are on pace to triple, quadruple that or more!
In 2012, President Obama extended the American’s with Disability Act to include websites.
In 2017, under Governor Jerry Brown, California extended the Unruh Act to make it discrimination for business websites to not work for the disabled!
What should businesses need to know especially in CA?
- 97% of websites in the US do not comply.
- If your developer has not spoken with you about accessibility, you are probably not compliant.
- The lawsuits are hitting the hospitality industry and branching out more and more each month. We noticed the first case we saw in August where a law firm was sued.
- There is not grace period to fix your site if you are sued.
- As with all laws, ignorance of the law is not an excuse.
What issues are we seeing businesses run into?
- You built an inexpensive site yourself. These are not compliant.
- Finding a company that fully understand compliance with WCAG.
- Companies that insist on selling you an audit. You spend way more than just hiring a qualified company to provide you with an accessible site. (This is less expensive in almost all instances.)
- Maintaining accessibility. (It is important to have an ongoing relationship with a company that will keep your site complaint.)
- Knowing who to trust in an area that seems very confusing.
We were blessed to be a resource on the following article:
Beyonce’s Official Website Got Sued — and Your’s Could Be Next
Another GREAT article: