My LinkedIn
Today I was scrolling through LinkedIn while eating my lunch and I thought, is my LinkedIn experience and representation of progress accurate, or have I fallen into an accessibility echo chamber….
My LinkedIn is now so full of amazing people who are dedicated to, and passionate about digital accessibility and inclusive design, it can be difficult to really see how the average person sees accessibility and the impact it’s making. I often assume were making great strides and things are always improving. But, is that just because I follow so many accessibility specialists and people in the field?
Are things improving and are large organisations really getting the message?
The European Accessibility Act (EAA)
The European Accessibility act for example. Only introduced last year (June 2025), but in it’s lead up to being formalised and it’s eventual inception, there was a lot of chatter on LinkedIn and wider social media on the impact it would have on large organisations, and if this new directive would really hold them accountable.
If you’re not sure what a directive is and how it differs from other types of legislation like I was, it’s basically a legislative act that sets out a goal that EU countries must achieve. So the European Union create the directive and it’s then up to the individual countries to figure out their own laws and penalties.
Because of this, there are differences in how member states have chosen to implement the directive. For example, Ireland are the only country to have criminal penalties for none-compliance. You can literally go to jail for 18 months. Countries like Spain have fines which range up to €1,000,000, whereas Austria’s fines only range up to €80,000.
Okay, so is this working?
This got me thinking about some of the largest enforcement that has happened since its introduction. I’ve seen bits and pieces. LinkedIn posts which detail an organisation that has fallen short of their responsibilities and has to pay x amount per day until they resolve them, but I didn’t have a holistic view on how many cases there were, their scale, and the impact those fines were having.
So, when applying fines or penalties, enforcement authorities must consider:
- The seriousness of the accessibility failure or issue
- How many products or services are affected
- How many people are effected
The EAA makes clear that penalties should not stand alone. This means business can’t just pay a fine and run, they must also fix the accessibility issues. I think this part is really important.
*Side note. I am not buying some of the excuses I’ve seen thrown around about how “harsh” these fines and timelines are. The EAA did not pop out of the ground one day as a big surprise. Organisations have had plenty of time to prepare, understand their compliance levels, create plans, and have roadmaps in place to support themselves if litigation or complaints were to come their way, no excuses.
Anyway, I thought I’d like to see a list of what’s happened so far and the impact that the directive is having and I couldn’t find anything. So I’ve pulled out everything I could find. I’ll detail some of the big hitters here and do a bit of analysis and a conclusion of what I think.
The action so far
It’s difficult at the moment to find a total number of cases of the EAA being enacted. In many cases the figures and penalties have not been disclosed.
I picked out three instances which I found most interesting and contained the most information. These were the landmark cases in which details of the penalties, reason for the act being enforced, the deadlines etc had been made public.
HelsaMi
HeksaMi is a web portal used by around 400,000 residents in Norway to view their medical records. Something very important for people, especially those with disabilities for whom it’s essential they can access medical records and assistance.
There were 119 accessibility accessibility issues initially discovered with the portal.
HelsaMi were given a remediation deadline by Norway’s inspectorate to fix all of the accessibility issues. When that deadline came around, there were still 64 issues which had not been resolved. The responsible authority provided the organisation with a decision: fix the outstanding accessibility issues by 19 December 2025, or pay NOK 50,000 (around £3700) per day until all outstanding issues are remediated.
Vueling Airlines
In 2025 Vueling Airlines, one of Spain’s largest airlines hit some turbulence. They were hit with a €90,000 fine for not complying with the European Accessibility Act and making their website accessible for people with disabilites. Subsequently, the airline has also been banned from receiving public funds from the Secretary of State for Social Rights for six months.
A quote from the court in this case was:
“If we examine the data, we find that of the 38 requirements that must be met according to this standard, 4, or 10.53%, are fully met. We find that 26 requirements, or 68.42%, are not met. In addition, 8 requirements, 21.05%, are not applicable”.
Vueling had already received a warning back in 2016 due to their lack of digital accessibility, and this case is an example of how large organisations often think they can ‘fly under the radar’.
French Supermarkets
France may be famous for it’s food, but it’s supermarkets are becoming infamous for their lack of digital accessibility.
I found this very surprising. People with disabilities are potentially some of the most likely to make use of a service like online shopping deliveries. If these supermarket chains couldn’t address accessibility for moral reasons, surely they would see the financial incentive in offering a fully accessible service to one of their largest markets. But clearly not…
In 2025 many of France’s largest supermarkets were hit with fines due to the inaccessibility of their online shopping service. Auchan, Carrefour, E. Leclerc and Picard Surgelés were all formally faced with legal action due to the inaccessibility of their online platforms and mobile applications.
Despite more than sufficient warning and time to prepare, four supermarket giants failed to meet the deadline and bring their online services up to the required level of compliance. Formal notices were sent in July 2025 demanding fixes by a September deadline. When meaningful progress didn’t follow, disability rights organizations , ApiDV, Droit Pluriel, and legal collective Intérêt à Agir, filed emergency injunctions in November 2025 to force immediate change.
The type of issues being discovered
Many of the issues found are issues commonly discovered during our accessibility audits:
- Reflow and text resizing issues
Browser zoom and text zooming causes a loss of content, causes content to become truncated or overlapping. Many users use the browser settings to zoom the page, or increase text sizing. Some people would be unable to read the page contents if this functionality is not supported. - Forms and errors
Contact forms lacked the necessary labelling and error handling to make form completion accessible and intuitive. Without accurate labels users can struggle to understand requirements. Users also rely on descriptive and helpful error messages to help them recover from errors. - Insufficient colour contrast
Foreground colours and background colours not meeting contrast requirements. People with low vision or visual impairments can find it difficult to perceive red text on a white background for example. - Keyboard navigation and focus styles
Interactive elements not being keyboard accessible. Users who don’t use a mouse can be unable to use some functionality or navigate to some areas of webpages.
Users also rely on a clearly visible focus style to see which element is currently in focus. Many of the websites and services mentioned in this blog lack a keyboard focus indicator, or the focus style fails to meet the contrast ratio’s required.
Final thoughts
I found the Vuelling instance quite interesting. They were given a warning, a slap on the wrist, back in 2016. In 2025 they have been given a substantial fine and received a lot of negative PR. This is maybe one of the best examples of how the EAA is making a difference and why organisations should be paying attention. Without the directive, there would not have been the weight behind the claims and they may have gotten away with it again.
While doing this research I found more articles than I thought I would. Mostly on the individual cases, but still a lot of negative PR. For some large organisations this might be the thing that really gives them the kick they need. £3700 a day might seem like nothing to a large business. It’s the backlash from the disability community, the negative outlook on their businesses, and the ability to choose a more accessible competitor which might need to be leveraged.
The more we talk about these cases, hold businesses accountable, and show support for the people that are most impacted by these poorly designed and built digital services, the more change will be made.
Get ahead of the complaints
If you’re reading this thinking you don’t know how accessible and usable your website, product, app, or service is for people with disabilities, find out.
Get an audit, do testing with people with disabilities, and work with accessibility specialists.
Give us a shout, we can help.
www.accessibilitysolutions.co.uk
