Services / Web accessibility audits
Web accessibility audits
Most business websites fail basic accessibility checks. The fixes are usually smaller than owners expect, and they widen your audience rather than narrowing it.
Why it matters here
In Australia, the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 applies to the provision of goods and services, and that includes websites. The Australian Human Rights Commission points to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines as the practical benchmark. Internationally, enforcement has been increasing, and Australian businesses selling to overseas customers are inside that scope.
There is also a straightforward commercial argument. Around one in five Australians lives with disability. A site that locks them out is losing business every day, quietly.
Why automated scans are not enough
Free scanning tools catch perhaps a third of accessibility problems, and they cannot judge whether alternative text is meaningful, whether a form can be completed with a keyboard alone, or whether an error message actually tells someone what went wrong. Those are the failures that stop people using a site.
I audit manually, with the automated checks used only as a starting point.
What I check
- Keyboard access: every control reachable and usable without a mouse, with a visible focus indicator.
- Colour contrast, measured rather than eyeballed, including text over images and buttons.
- Forms: labels, error messages, and whether help is available where it is needed.
- Structure: headings, landmarks and reading order, which is how screen reader users navigate.
- Images and media: meaningful alternative text, captions and transcripts.
- Target size and spacing, one of the newer WCAG 2.2 requirements that catches many sites.
- Motion and animation, and whether reduced-motion preferences are respected.
- Mobile: zoom, orientation, and reflow at small widths.
What you get
A report listing each failure, the WCAG success criterion it breaches, how serious it is in practice, and what the fix is in terms your web developer can act on. Ranked so you can do the ten-minute wins first.
If you would rather not brief a developer, I can quote a fixed price to make the fixes and re-test.
Assessed against: WCAG 2.2, Level AA
Common questions
How long does an audit take?
It depends on how many distinct page types you have, not how many pages. A brochure site with five templates is a much smaller job than a site with a booking flow, a member area and a checkout. I quote a fixed price once I have seen the site.
Will an accessibility overlay or widget fix this?
No. Overlay widgets have a poor record, are rejected by many people who rely on assistive technology, and have themselves been the subject of complaints overseas. The durable fix is in the site itself, and it is usually cheaper than a yearly overlay subscription.
What standard do you audit against?
WCAG 2.2 at Level AA, which is the level most regulators and procurement processes reference. If you have a contractual obligation to a different level, tell me and I will audit against that.
Related services
Start with a free check
I run a short external diagnostic and send you what I find. No obligation, and no pitch if there is nothing worth fixing.
I assess your systems and documents against published standards, identify where the gaps are, and give you the documentation to show you have addressed them. This is not legal advice.