There Are Only Two Ways to Find Out Whether Your online shop Is Accessible
1. Wait until you get sued.
2. Ask a professional to evaluate it.
Most businesses choose a third option: they think everything is fine. Unfortunately, that assumption can be expensive.
As a blind accessibility consultant, I regularly encounter barriers that prevent me from completing everyday online tasks. Recently, I was unable to open a bank account because the registration form was inaccessible. I could not book a flight because the date picker didn’t work with screen readers. I could not purchase a product I wanted, because the checkout process was not designed for blind users or people with motor disabilities.
Each of those businesses lost at least 1 customer.
How would you feel if you couldn’t complete a simple task online? How would you feel if your child faced the same obstacle?
For millions of people with disabilities, barriers like these are part of daily life.
For businesses, they often represent missed opportunities.
Accessibility barriers remain common across ecommerce websites.
Many decision-makers still underestimate the purchasing power of people with disabilities or assume accessibility has little impact on business performance.
People with disabilities shop online nearly twice as often as the general population. For many of them leaving the home is not that easy, so they decide to buy through ecommerce.
One of the best-known examples comes from Tesco, the UK’s leading supermarket chain. The company invested approximately £35,000 in accessibility improvements and reported an additional £13 million in annual revenue. Those numbers become easier to understand when viewed through actual customer behavior.
My website hosting provider once offered me a personalized email service for $20 per year. I gladly purchased it. Shortly afterward, I discovered that the service was inaccessible. As a result, I switched to a fully accessible alternative that cost me $93.60 annually.
Many people with disabilities invest significant time finding products and services they can use independently. When they find an accessible solution, they are often more likely to remain customers and recommend it to others.
Making your online store disability friendly is only the beginning. If you want to see the full business benefit, potential customers need to know accessibility matters to your organization. Here is what to do:
Accessibility should become part of your overall marketing strategy rather than a one-time technical project. Organizations often report improvements in brand perception, customer loyalty, and audience reach after investing in accessibility.
Many companies assume their developers already understand accessibility. In reality, accessibility is a specialized discipline. Recently, I spoke with the CEO of a mid-sized company who confidently told me:
“Our developers already know accessibility. We are accessible by default.”
Within minutes, I demonstrated an accessibility issue that prevented me from doing a critical task on the website. If accessibility barriers prevent users from completing transactions, there is still work to be done.
Most development teams are highly skilled at building products. Accessibility, however, is rarely a major part of formal software development education. This is why many organizations benefit from external expertise, especially at the beginning of their accessibility journey. Consultants help teams identify issues faster, avoid costly mistakes, and transfer knowledge to internal staff.
Another option is hiring agencies that provide complete remediation services. While this can be effective, it often leaves internal teams without a deeper understanding of accessibility principles.
A more sustainable approach is collaboration: consultants identify issues, developers implement solutions, and accessibility knowledge gradually becomes part of the organization’s internal expertise.
Over the course of auditing hundreds of ecommerce pages, I have noticed the same issues appearing repeatedly:
These issues may appear minor, but they cause losses that most businesses neglect.
Accessibility is not something you achieve once and forget about. It requires continuous attention, periodic testing, and a commitment to inclusive design as products evolve. The good news is that accessibility becomes easier once teams understand the principles behind it. Getting started is often the biggest challenge. The sooner accessibility becomes part of your development process, the sooner more customers can successfully use your products and services.
Web accessibility ensures that disabled people can use online services, just like those without disabilities. It typically refers to websites, mobile applications, and other digital platforms.
To achieve this, the website or APP should be designed and developed in accordance with the WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines), which is internationally recognized accessibility standard for accessibility. In a nutshell, WCAG is the technical standard. It gives plenty of user scenarios that may present barriers for people with disabilities on the web, and tells how to fix them.
Due to the legal pressure, more and more companies are obliged to make their websites and mobile Apps accessible. And a lot of them have already taken significant steps towards this. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), requires businesses selling in the US to make their online services available to people with disabilities.
Many companies have already faced lawsuits under this law, often resulting in substantial financial fines. In addition, court decisions frequently include remediating the digital content, so it becomes disability friendly. In 2025 alone, almost 4000 lawsuits were filed in the United States over web inaccessibility.
This number is not final, as many cases are resolved through out-of-court settlements. It is also important to note that the law does not apply to companies with fewer than 15 employees.
On June 28, 2025, the European Accessibility Act (EAA) entered into force across EU member states. This law applies to companies that operate in or sell products and services within the EU market, regardless of where they are registered.
A few lawsuits against businesses based in Europe were already filed by individuals with disabilities, and associations representing them. In cases where companies rely on external vendors such as payment systems beyond their direct control, transition period until June 28, 2030 is given. This should allow those providers to make the necessary accessibility adjustments. Companies and organizations with fewer than 10 employees, or those with annual revenue below €2000000, are exempt from this law.
Companies that neglect accessibility leave a lot of money on the table. people with disabilities shop online nearly twice as often as the general population. Tesco, the leading UK’s supermarket chain invested £35000 in website accessibility., which brought in additional revenue of over £13 million a year.
Similar to Wheelchair Ramps in the physical world, implementing accessibility standards makes the digital space more inclusive. Accessible digital content is not only beneficial for disabled. It improves the experience for all users. Disability friendly websites are easy to navigate, allowing better usability and higher user satisfaction to all visitors.
Businesses that prioritize accessibility receive 35% fewer support requests than their competitors.
Also, social media boost accessible content, so companies can reach a wider audience more effectively. Accessible websites are typically structured in a clear and logical way, with well-organized headings that make information easier to find.
This benefits not only people with disabilities but also non/disabled users, especially those browsing on smaller devices such as smartphones and tablets. So, investing in accessibility is not just a moral responsibility. It is extremely wise business decision.
Web accessibility is a relatively new and often misunderstood field. Due to the so many myths among developers and managers, maximizing accessibility takes way longer then it should. One of the most common misconceptions is that overlay solutions are enough to become accessible and ensure legal compliance. Some people think that adding a widget that allows users to select options based on their type of disability automatically makes a website accessible.
However, these widgets only add a few lines of code. Although this can fix a few minor issues, such solutions hide key challenges affecting disabled users. In 2025, over 40% of accessibility-related lawsuits in the United States were filed against companies with overlays installed.
Another common myth is that accessibility requires you to sacrifice design. In reality, 90%+ of accessibility issues are resolved through code changes, without touching the visual appearance. Accessibility and strong design can absolutely coexist when properly integrated. Another belief is that automated testing and AI tools can detect all accessibility issues. While automation can identify up to 30% of basic problems, more complex issues often stay unnoticed.
The best way to find them is via manual accessibility audit process, where users with disabilities also participate. Many people assume that investing in accessibility is not profitable. Well, that up to 10% of monthly online transactions are abandoned because disabled customers can not complete their purchases as a result of inaccessible online shop..
Additionally, the purchasing power of people with disabilities is estimated at $1.9 trillion.
This process is not universal. It depends on a range of factors such as a company’s size, maturity, and organizational structure. While some companies have dedicated in-house accessibility teams, most rely on external consultants, especially in the early stages of implementation.
The typical path toward accessibility usually look like this:
Step 1. External consultant checks the website/app accessibility. Result of this audit is the detailed report, with all accessibility issues and recommended fixes for each of them.
Step 2. The client’s development team fix those issues.
Step 3. External consultant verifies that issues are resolved, and provides appropriate accessibility certificate proving this.
It is the official letter, which confirms the accessibility level achieved.
While initial testing and remediation are essential first steps, they are not enough to ensure long-term accessibility. Companies that want to see full benefits of this investment need to treat accessibility as an ongoing commitment. This includes regularly monitoring new content and thorough audits done from time to time.
Accessibility should be integrated into the marketing and brand strategy, as well as become part of the corporate culture. Although it may initially seem like a continuous investment with uncertain returns, once internal teams fully adopt accessibility principles, they begin applying them almost instinctively.
As a result, the need for external support becomes minimal over time. In today’s regulatory landscape, developers with strong accessibility skills are highly demanded. Accessibility can really become a powerful competitive advantage. But you must take that first step. Are you ready?