Accessibility statement: what goes in one and why honesty is the point

An accessibility statement is a page describing how accessible your website is, what standard you are working to, where it currently falls short, and how to contact you if something blocks a visitor. Public bodies are required to publish one in many jurisdictions, and private businesses increasingly do too — but the reason to write one is more practical than legal: it is the page that turns a barrier into a message you can act on rather than a customer who quietly leaves.

The temptation is to write it as a claim of compliance. That is the version that ages badly and reads as false the moment somebody hits a problem. A statement that names known gaps is more credible, more useful and, in most regimes that require one, closer to what is actually asked for.

What belongs in the statement

• The standard you are working to, with version and level — commonly WCAG 2.2 at level AA, explained in wcag.
• An honest conformance position: fully conformant, partially conformant, or not yet assessed. Partial is the truthful answer for most sites and is a legitimate thing to publish.
• The known problems, listed plainly, with what you intend to do and roughly when. This is the section people skip and the one that gives the page its credibility.
• How to report a barrier: an email address or form, and a realistic response time you will honour.
• What happens next if the person is not satisfied — the escalation route, which is prescribed by law in some jurisdictions.
• How the site was assessed: self-assessment, automated tools, an external audit, testing with assistive technology. Say which, because they are not equivalent.
• The date the statement was prepared and last reviewed. An undated statement is assumed stale, correctly.

What not to write

Avoid claiming full conformance unless you have tested properly and can defend it — an unverified claim is worse than an honest partial one, because it converts a technical gap into a misleading statement. Avoid vague commitment language with no dates: we are committed to accessibility and are continually improving says nothing and is recognised as saying nothing. And avoid listing an accessibility overlay widget as your solution; the practitioners who advise on these matters are consistently critical of them, and naming one does not substitute for the fixes underneath.

Keeping it true

1. Write it after a real assessment, even a modest one — the ten-minute keyboard test plus a scanner is a legitimate starting point if you say that is what you did.
2. List the gaps you know about rather than waiting until they are fixed. The statement is a status report, not a certificate.
3. Put a review date in a calendar, and update the page when something changes on either side — a fix shipped or a new problem introduced.
4. Route the contact address to a person who will answer. A reporting channel nobody reads is worse than none, because it implies a promise.
5. Link it from the footer, on every page. A statement nobody can find serves nobody.

The single most valuable line in the statement is the contact route, and it is the one most often filled with a generic address. Someone who cannot complete a purchase because a field is unlabelled is telling you about lost revenue, for free, in a form specific enough to fix. That message arriving and being answered is worth more than the rest of the page combined.

Publishing it

Ettex Sites is where the page lives, linked from the footer alongside the other standing pages — the cookie side of which is covered in cookie notice. The practical fixes the statement will describe are in wcag and alt text.

Being clear about the limits: we do not audit sites, do not certify conformance and do not provide a statement template that would be legally sufficient in your jurisdiction. Several regimes prescribe specific wording and a specific escalation route; where you are required to publish one, check what your regulator actually mandates rather than adapting somebody else's page.