The global digital accessibility landscape is complex. Directives, transpositions, regulations, standards—what are they, how do they differ, and how do they fit into the bigger picture? And then there are the acronyms—EAA, WCAG, EN 301 549, to name just a few. Not to mention VPAT and ACR. It’s a lot to comprehend.
With the European Accessibility Act’s (EAA) 2025 deadline now behind us, digital accessibility in Europe is particularly complex, as there can be differences from country to country. Even in the simplest use cases, it’s not always easy to figure out how to be proactive, minimize risk, and consistently deliver accessible experiences.
Having expert guidance is essential for navigating these complexities, and it’s crucial to understand not only the terms but also the concepts behind them. Most critically, you need to understand your obligations—how to align with EAA, meet regulatory compliance requirements, and achieve conformance.
In this post, we’ll help you understand the relevant terms and concepts, determine what’s required of your organization, and guide you on your next steps.
The EAA is a directive
The European Accessibility Act (EAA) is a directive of the European Union that aims to improve the accessibility of products and services for people with disabilities and the aging population in the EU.
The key word here is “directive.” The EAA is a directive, not a law. While the goals it lays out are legally binding, each member state in the European Union (EU) must enact its own regulations to ensure the directive is implemented. Each country has discretion regarding the form and approach it takes with its regulations.
To align with the requirements and objectives of the EAA, each member state is required to transpose the directive into national law. The country has the right to enhance multiple laws, as well as to make a unique and specific law. Because of this, we see that in some countries, you need to review several national laws to map things back to the EAA Directive, as the requirements were spread across several existing laws.
Legal compliance
Any organization selling into or within the EU is potentially subject to the EAA and must be EAA-compliant accordingly. But let’s unpack what that means in actual practice.
Because the EAA is a directive and not a law, it is not directly applicable. As we described above, it must be transposed. When we say that an organization is compliant with the EAA, what we are implying is that it complies with transposed national laws of the 27 member states.
This is where things can get complicated because, as we noted above, there may be differences on a country-by-country basis. However, before we get further into those complexities, let’s explore what it means to comply with a law and how compliance relates to, and differs from, conformance.
Conformance with a standard
To ensure that its accessibility goals are met, the EAA requires that member states base their accessibility standards on a harmonized European standard. Currently, EN 301 549 v3.1.2 is the standard of accessibility requirements for Information and Communications Technology (ICT) products and services in the European Union.
A standard in and of itself is not a law, and conformance to a standard is technically voluntary. A country makes conformance a legal requirement by incorporating it into its transposed national law.
To understand how this all works together, think of it like this:
By conforming to a standard (EN 301 549), you achieve compliance with a regulation (transposed national law), and by complying with the law, you are in alignment with the directive (EAA).
Testing to a standard
To achieve conformance with a standard, you must test against the standard. In other words, you must assess your digital properties to ensure they meet the requirements defined by the standard.
An easy way to understand this is to think about emissions testing for vehicles (“smog checks”). To determine whether your vehicle can be legally driven, you must see if it can “pass” an emissions test. This test assesses how well your vehicle measures up against defined success criteria. Testing to an accessibility standard works in the same way. Testing assesses how your digital asset or property measures up against defined success criteria.
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are widely accepted as the go-to standard for digital accessibility conformance. They serve as the basis of many accessibility regulations worldwide. WCAG guidelines are periodically updated by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), with the most recent version being WCAG 2.2.
EN 301 549 v3.2.1 is based on WCAG 2.1 Level AA, but also includes at least 64 additional requirements. For your organization to align with EAA requirements, you theoretically must achieve EN 301 549 conformance. However, this is another area where things can become complicated, as not every member state has incorporated EN 301 549 in its transposition.
We’ll examine two examples in a moment: one where the situation is straightforward, and one where it’s more complex.
Before we do that, however, let’s recap what we’ve covered so far:
The EAA is a directive to each EU member state (country). As such, it is not directly applicable to organizations and businesses; it must be transposed into national law in each EU country. An organization selling into or within a given member state must comply with that country’s transposed law. Compliance with that transposed law requires conformance with the standard embraced by the transposed law. Conformance is assessed and achieved via testing.
Documenting conformance
The final step in this process we’ve been outlining involves having proof of conformance. To understand this step, we can again rely on our emissions test example. If your vehicle passes the emissions test, this is good news. However, for your vehicle to be street-legal, the test results must be reported to a monitoring body. In the United States, for example, that monitoring body is the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Test results must be submitted in an acceptable format. This is why we go to authorized smog check providers. A sticker on your windscreen and a document for your glovebox are additional methods you can use to prove conformance.
Conformance to accessibility standards works in a similar manner. Testing can confirm that you’re conformant, but to be compliant (i.e., to be “legal”), you have to have proof of your conformance—in some countries, you may have to proactively share a report of your results. One way to do this is by using a template called a VPAT (Voluntary Product Accessibility Template) to draft an Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR). VPATs are available in multiple editions, including an INT edition that includes the specifics related to EN 301 549. You can use the INT edition to draft an ACR that demonstrates conformance to EN 301 549. Bear in mind, however, that reporting requirements may vary.
Let’s now do another recap before continuing to our straightforward and complex examples:
The EAA is a directive that gets transposed into national law. Compliance with the law requires conformance with the standard established by the law. Conformance is assessed and achieved via testing. Conformance is demonstrated through reporting. By documenting conformance (and providing reports when requested), you are compliant with the law. By being compliant with the law, you are in alignment with the EAA.
Aligning with EAA requirements: A straightforward case in Austria
Austria has made things relatively seamless when it comes to aligning with the EAA, offering a straightforward pathway that adds no noteworthy complicating factors.
Austria’s transposition of the EAA is the Barrierefreiheitsgesetz, or Accessibility Act, commonly known by its acronym BaFG. The surveillance authority in Austria charged with ensuring EAA alignment is the Federal Office for Social Affairs and Disability.
Testing and reporting requirements under the BaFG are largely a matter of following the steps we’ve already outlined. We recommend testing against EN 301 549 and keeping a record of your testing. We also advise that using the INT version of the VPAT template to draft your ACR is the right thing to do.
In this way, you’re able to demonstrate conformance with the EN 301 549 standard, which enables you to achieve compliance with the BaFG, which means you’re in alignment with the EAA.
Now, of course, everything is not quite so simple in actual practice. You still need to actually understand BaFG requirements—how they apply, and what they apply to. You also need to know what to do when testing reveals accessibility issues. How do you fix them, report them, and prevent them from happening again? And you certainly need to be aware of the potential fines or penalties for failing to comply. In Austria, fines can range up to EUR 80,000 per violation, depending on the severity.
This is why, even in a relatively straightforward situation like the one Austria presents, it’s still essential to have expert guidance, which you can get directly from Deque or through one of our partners. In Austria, our partner is A11YPLAN, a specialized accessibility consultancy that can provide localized digital accessibility support.
Aligning with EAA requirements: A more complex case in France
While France has embraced EAA alignment with the same commitment to accessibility and inclusivity that Austria has, the approach differs. Most notably, France has the RGAA (Référentiel général d’amélioration de l’accessibilité, or “General Accessibility Improvement Framework”).
The RGAA actually predates the EAA. In fact, France has been a digital accessibility pioneer since 2005, when Law No. 2005-102 (also known as the “Montchamp Law”) was passed. It was followed by the RGAA in 2009.
In 2023, via Decree No. 2023-931, the RGAA was updated and expanded to align with the EAA.
Written into the RGAA regulation is the RGAA digital accessibility standard. This further complicates RGAA, as it’s both a regulation and a standard.
One more layer of complication has to do with success criteria. While the RGAA standard is derived from WCAG 2.1 Level AA, it differs in its degree of specificity, granularity, and scope. RGAA adds requirements beyond WCAG 2.1 AA, and even excludes one WCAG 2.1 AA requirement (1.2.4 Live Captioning). Ultimately, the RGAA breaks things down into 106 detailed criteria—most of which map back to WCAG’s 50 success criteria. In other words, RGAA covers much of the same ground and aims to achieve similar results to WCAG 2.1 Level AA, but it uses 106 criteria to get there and adds over 70 issues beyond WCAG 2.1 AA.
Conformance testing
Having a specific, localized implementation and testing framework in place (RGAA) obviously complicates matters when it comes to testing for conformance, particularly if you’re a multinational organization selling into and throughout the EU, and not just France.
Consider just the two countries we’ve examined so far. At first glance, as a multinational, it would appear you’d have to conduct two entirely distinct testing efforts: one for Austria, to conform to EN 301 549, and one for France, to conform to the RGAA.
Right?
Actually, not necessarily.
Technically, France allows you to test to EN 301 549, provided you can meet certain conditions:
- Your audit and test methodology must be able to be communicated upon request by a user or an administrator.
- You must be able to provide a correspondence table that links criteria to tests.
- You must indicate in your accessibility statement that you have tested to EN 301 549.
However, there remains the challenge of reporting.
Conformance summary reporting
The RGAA requires summary conformance using percentages, and classifies these percentages into three categories:
- Fully compliant (100% of test criteria are met)
- Partially compliant (50% or higher are met)
- Non-compliant (less than 50% are met)
Adherence to RGAA requires that organizations display their level of compliance on their website.
This means that if you test for EN 301 549, you still must effectively translate the results so that your accessibility status level can be reported in alignment with the RGAA percentage model. The RGAA also requires that you publish an accessibility statement, which includes not only your status level but also your non-accessible content and your plan for addressing that content.
These are just some of the key ways in which France presents a comparatively more complex conformance and compliance scenario.
Should my organization test to RGAA or EN 301 549?
Determining what’s right for your organization depends on many factors. This is another area where expert guidance is essential. Our expert strategic consultants at Deque can help you understand the complexities and empower you to make the best choice for your situation.
We also have our partner Ipedis in France, who can provide localized support and guidance.
Ultimately, you’re looking at a business choice that must be made with consideration for your unique use case. But one way or another, you’re going to test conformance to a standard—either RGAA or EN 301 549 (or both). And if you sell into or within France, you’ll need to make a conformance report available to your French customers, and that report will need to:
- be in French
- be reported within your accessibility statement
- state if you are fully, partially, or non-conformant
- identify your non-accessible content (if applicable) and your robust plan to address the non-conformance
You might be a medium-sized business based in France, with an e-commerce website visible only in France, that ships only to French addresses. Or, you might be a large, US-based multinational that does business in 130 countries, including France. Either way, the reality is the same—you’ll need to determine which standard you test to, run your tests, get your results, and report conformance as defined by the countries where you do business.
Next steps
Our goal in this post has been two-fold: 1) We want to help you gain clarity on the complexities associated with compliance and conformance in the EAA era, and 2) We want to encourage you to work with digital accessibility experts to ensure you’re taking the right steps to align your business with the EAA’s requirements.
Contact us today, and let’s work together to develop a plan tailored to your organization’s unique needs.