Communicating with Everyone - Accessibility Statements
UK, EU, and US legislation all require an accessibility statement to be published on the organisational website. See relevant legislation sections for details, templates, guidance, and examples.
An accessibility statement is different to an accessibility policy in that it is publicly available and aimed at communicating about the accessibility of your book files and website in as plain language as possible. The purpose of an accessibility statement is to communicate with all members of the public and with any legislative auditors, and it is completed at the whole press level (rather than for individual books).
The statement details compliance with standards, parts that are not yet accessible, and future plans for remedying that. It is also where you provide contact details, enabling individual accessibility requests. This allows readers to understand the accessibility of your content without having to check it themselves, building trust through the assurance that you are addressing these issues consistently over the long term.
Because of all these benefits, even if you are exempt from the legal requirement to put a statement in place, it is still recommended to have something that communicates the above publicly. You could follow the legal guidance for your country as a starting point.
Examples
ASPIRE
The ASPIRE list for publishers is a review and verification service for accessibility statements. They analyse public accessibility statements and give them a percentage score, a rank, and a rating (e.g. Gold).
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