5 August 2026

The accessibility statement: what the law really requires, and what it is not

The European Accessibility Act requires service providers to publish a document explaining how their service meets the accessibility requirements. This is set out in Article 13(2) and Annex V of Directive (EU) 2019/882. It is not the same as the accessibility statement you know from government websites, and it is not a certification mark. It must be included in your terms and conditions or an equivalent document, it must be available in writing and orally, it must itself be accessible, and you must retain it for as long as you offer the service.

Below, we explain what the directive literally requires, where the confusion with the public sector statement comes from, and which part almost everyone overlooks.

What the law literally requires

Article 13(2) is one paragraph long and requires four things at once. You prepare the information in accordance with Annex V. You explain how your service meets the requirements. You make that information publicly available, in writing and orally, including in a way that is accessible to people with disabilities. And you retain it for as long as the service is in operation.

Annex V specifies what it must contain. Three substantive elements:

• a general description of the service in accessible formats
• the descriptions and explanations necessary to understand how the service works
• a description of how your service meets the requirements set out in Annex I

Note where the annex says this should appear: in the terms and conditions or an equivalent document. Not in a separate PDF tucked away at the bottom of the menu.

What it is not

Almost everyone who hears “accessibility statement” thinks of the statement for public sector websites. That comes from a different European directive, 2016/2102, and works differently: a fixed model, a mandatory feedback mechanism and a link to the enforcement procedure. That obligation applies to public sector bodies. For a webshop, that model is not a template you can adopt, because it answers a different question.

Nor is it a quality mark. There is no body that approves your statement, and no one gives you a badge for it. And it is not something a scan hands to you: a scan measures, a statement describes. Anyone who confuses the two publishes a claim they cannot substantiate. A statement without an underlying measurement is therefore itself a risk.

The part almost everyone overlooks

In addition to those three substantive points, Annex V contains another provision, point 3, which requires something entirely different. You must provide information demonstrating that the conformance of your service is ensured by the service provision process and its monitoring.

This is not about the state of your website today, but about how you maintain that state. It ties in with Article 13(3), which requires procedures that keep your service conformant, taking into account three types of change: changes to your service provision, changes to the requirements, and changes to the harmonised standards.

In practical terms, this means that a report from fourteen months ago describes a moment in time, not a process. The law requires both.

“In writing and orally”, what does that mean?

The honest answer is that the directive says this, but does not elaborate. It does not say whether an audio version is sufficient, or whether you need an accessible telephone channel. We do not know, and we are not going to fill in the gaps. Put that question to your lawyer, and state in your statement what you actually offer.

Where WCAG fits into this

Nowhere, literally. The directive does not mention WCAG. What the directive does do is link a presumption of conformity to harmonised standards whose reference has been published in the Official Journal of the EU, and only insofar as those standards cover the requirements (article 15). Annex V lays down the same condition: you may apply those standards in full or in part to meet point 1, provided that their reference has been published. Under this directive, that has not yet happened for any standard, so that presumption does not currently exist. In practice, EN 301 549 is used, a European standard for accessible ICT that refers to WCAG for websites. That standard is harmonised under the directive on public sector websites (2016/2102), not under this directive. Following it is advisable, but it does not provide a legal presumption here.

That is precisely why a statement is not optional: if you base it on a standard, you must review it when a new version of that standard is published.

Does this actually apply to me?

The micro-enterprise exemption is consistently misquoted. According to Article 3, point 23, a micro-enterprise is an enterprise with fewer than 10 employees and an annual turnover or an annual balance sheet total not exceeding 2 million euros. The number of employees is a strict threshold: from 10 people onwards, the exemption no longer applies, regardless of your figures. For the financial threshold, meeting either of the two criteria is sufficient. Check this against your annual figures and consult your accountant.

What can you do now?

Start with the section that only you can write: the description of your service and how it works. That is customer-focused work, not measurement work.

The section that does involve measurement, the description of how you meet the requirements, can only be substantiated once you know where you stand. And because that statement must be retained for as long as you offer the service, while Annex V point 3 also asks about your process, that initial assessment is not a snapshot that you then discard. It is the first entry in a record that you will need to maintain in any event.

With one honest caveat: automated testing covers part of the standard. Our scanner tests 31 of the 55 WCAG AA criteria automatically, either partially or fully; the rest requires human assessment, and we always make that clear.

Wexlo scans websites for accessibility and is transparent about what automated testing can and cannot detect. This article provides information, not legal advice.