As website owners, site builders and designers, and in general, you are most likely aware of the issue of website accessibility and the legal obligations related to it. If you are the owner of a "regular", non-online business, you are also familiar with the issue of accessibility in its broader sense. You most likely dealt with it as part of the process of obtaining a business license. However, quite a few business owners (who receive the public) who also maintain a website are unaware of their duty to publish on the website the accessibility arrangements at the business itself. More and more lawsuits are being filed on these matters, where in some cases the business itself, the place where the service is provided to the public, is perfectly accessible (it is just that the website did not describe things as required). The purpose of this article is to raise awareness of the matter, with the aim of fulfilling the purpose of the law, which is to assist people with disabilities. In doing so, businesses will also be spared legal proceedings and expenses that are not mandated by reality.
In Israel there are more than a million and a half people with some kind of disability: elderly people, young people and children. Without accommodations, these people struggle, and often are simply unable, to take real part in the public sphere and to consume services that are trivial for most of us. The difficulty of functioning in an environment that does not take various limitations into account makes their lives hard and often – impossible. Recognizing our duty to enable people with disabilities to take full part in society is the basis for the accessibility processes that have taken an increasingly central place in recent years.
Accessibility, of course, does not boil down to the ability to reach a particular physical place. Accessibility includes convenient access to various services, to positions, to decision-making abilities and to taking part in various activities in all areas of life. The Israeli legislator recognized this, and the definition set in the Equal Rights for Persons with Disabilities Law deals not only with the possibility of reaching a place, but with the ability to find one's way around, the ability to enjoy a service, the ability to receive information, the ability to use facilities and to take part in various activities, all in an equal, dignified, independent and safe manner.
The place and importance of the online space has not been overlooked by Israeli law. The internet occupies a place no less central than the physical space. As such, it must be accessible, friendly and welcoming to different populations. Indeed, at the end of a lengthy process involving various parties, among them the Israeli Internet Association, the "Service Accessibility Regulations" came into effect in 2017, dealing with the issue of making websites in Israel accessible. Like many countries around the world, Israel adopted standards relating to various elements, textual and other, on the website. What exists is far from meeting the needs, but it seems things are improving and awareness is growing. The technology, developing at a dizzying pace, also holds the promise of significant changes in these areas, and quite a few projects deal with the field.
The duty to publish the accessibility arrangements that exist in the business itself within the website
As stated in the introduction, issues concerning making a business accessible to people with disabilities are familiar to almost every business owner, if only because obtaining a business license requires meeting various requirements in this regard. The same applies to making websites accessible. Website owners, and certainly website builders and designers, know the subject and are mostly aware of the requirements. However, it turns out that precisely in the integration between the business itself and its website, the legal provision requiring the business owner to publish on his website the accessibility arrangements of the business itself apparently eludes quite a few businesses. This obligation is anchored in Section 34(a)(4) of the Accessibility of Services Regulations, titled "Publication of the accessibility adjustments that were made":
"34. (a) One who is required to make accommodations to the service shall publish the accessibility accommodations that were made in the service and in the public places in which the service is provided, including the auxiliary aids and auxiliary services provided in the service upon request and the manner of obtaining them, in these ways and as the case may be:
(1) in the accepted advertising methods of the service it provides;
(2) in the accessibility accommodations for information as detailed in Regulation 29;
(3) At the request of a person with a disability, by one of the following: telephone, fax, mail, email, text message or other digital means, and subject to the means used by the service provider;
(4) through the service provider's website, if one exists."
Sub-section (4) essentially states that if the service provider, that is, the business (which receives the public), has a website, it must use it to publish the accessibility adjustments that were made on site. From the wording of the section, it appears that the duty to publish accessibility adjustments stands on its own, and therefore even if the business met its various obligations and is accessible as required by law, if it did not properly publish the details on its website, it has allegedly breached its duty. The logic is clear: suppose a person who uses a wheelchair intends to visit a particular café. It would be intolerable if, upon arriving at the place itself, he discovered that he cannot enjoy the services there because, for example, the entrance is not accessible, the restrooms are not accessible, or there is no suitable parking. Assuming the café has a website, it is clear that had the accessibility arrangements been published on the site, that person would have been spared the aggravation and the enormous waste of time.
Indeed, more and more publications have recently appeared about businesses facing legal proceedings because they did not publish, as part of the accessibility statement on their website, the accessibility arrangements at the business itself. In some cases, according to the publications, the businesses themselves are in fact accessible, but apparently out of ignorance, and not intentionally, they did not take care to publish the accessibility arrangements.
This article is not a legal opinion and is not intended to replace consultation with an attorney and professionals, and certainly does not purport to determine what is right or what the correct interpretation of the law is. Its purpose is to bring these matters to the readers' attention so that they give thought to them and, where necessary, seek appropriate advice. In this way we hope to contribute both to strengthening the field of accessibility, which has first-rate social value, and to helping business owners who sometimes, in good faith, out of lack of knowledge, are unaware of this obligation.
