Why you shouldn’t overlook your business website’s accessibility

From online retail shopping and grocery orders to conducting business and executing documents electronically to communicating with family and friends from afar, you’ll be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn’t utilize online platforms to complete many of their daily tasks. Retailers and other companies who utilize their websites as a means of conducting business spend significant time, effort and resources to ensure their platforms run seamlessly and are aesthetically pleasing.

But one aspect they may overlook is whether those platforms are accessible to all patrons, including those with disabilities.

In this LINC Q&A, McAfee & Taft attorney Alyssa Lankford discusses how Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to business websites and their accessibility for disabled and impaired viewers. She talks about the dramatic rise in ADA discrimination lawsuits against business large and small, even though there is still ambiguity surrounding the law, including which Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) guidelines apply to businesses that qualify as places of public accommodation under the ADA, as well as who has the legal standing to file such a lawsuit.