Which documents do you need for an accessibility file?
For most businesses, an accessibility file consists of four components: an overview of which products, websites or apps fall under the requirements, a statement describing the extent to which they are complied with, the documentation on which that statement is based, and a register of notifications or complaints with how they were handled. That sounds straightforward, and it is in principle — the detail that distinguishes this file from, say, a product safety or packaging file does not lie in the list itself, but in what lies behind it.
With product safety or packaging, you prove something with a test report or a material specification that was established at a specific point in time and remains valid thereafter, until the product changes. With accessibility, it works differently: the statement you publish is a snapshot of a situation that keeps moving. An update to your website, a new feature in your app, or a change that someone else makes for you can quickly make the documentation outdated. The file is therefore not something you compile once and file away, but something you keep current for as long as the product or service exists.
What usually goes in it
The core of the file typically consists of the following documents: an inventory of the products, websites or services you offer that may fall under the accessibility requirements, the accessibility statement itself stating which components do and do not comply, the report or assessment on which that statement is based, often carried out by an internal tester or a specialized firm, and an overview of notifications from users who have experienced a problem, with what has been done about it.
Which documents are specifically required for your business and in what form depends on what you offer and to whom. You do not make that assessment on the basis of this article; for that the official text of the regulations, and where doubt exists, a lawyer or the competent supervisor is the right point of contact. answers to frequently asked questions provides an initial direction, but does not replace that advice.
Why this file keeps changing
Where a packaging file largely remains static once the packaging does not change, an accessibility file is tied to something that in most businesses is constantly changing: the website, the web shop, the app. Any amendment to it can affect the previously established documentation. That is why this file in practice is less about collecting documents once and for all, and more about repeating the same assessment at fixed intervals, and keeping track of when that was last done.
That last point — knowing when something was last assessed and when it needs to be again — is precisely where many businesses lose the thread. Not because the initial assessment is missing, but because no one remembers whether the next one is already scheduled.
Where these documents come from
You usually draw up the inventory and the notification register yourself, using data you already have: which products and channels you operate, and who has reported what. The assessment itself often comes from an external party. In both cases, the following applies: the documents only become usable as a file when they are in one place alongside the business data they belong to — the same Chamber of Commerce number, the same product list, the same contact details you also enter for other obligations.
This is immediately where the overlap with other compliance topics arises. The basic data of your business and your products also appear in a product safety or packaging file, and are often entered separately on platforms that know nothing of each other. what does and does not happen with your data explains how that comes together without platforms themselves adopting anything from each other that you have not authorized.
One file, multiple platforms
reglia does not draw up an accessibility statement itself and does not assess whether a website meets the requirements — that is done by the platform set up for that purpose. What reglia does do is ensure that the business and product data that appear in that file are entered only once, so you don't have to supply them again for each platform. which platforms there are and what they do provides an overview of what exactly is involved for accessibility and the other subjects.
Would you like to see which platforms are currently connected and which part of your data you enter only once with them? Then check which platforms there are and which file goes with them.