A client launches a website. Six months later a customer emails to say she cannot complete the booking form using a screen reader.
The form fields have no labels, the error messages are conveyed only by colour, and the submit control cannot be reached by keyboard. None of this was deliberate and none of it was considered.
Fixing it now means rebuilding the form and reviewing the whole site. Building it correctly would have cost almost nothing at the time.
Ask 1: what obligations apply to this site
Legal requirements vary by jurisdiction, sector and whether the organisation is public facing. Establishing this at the start determines the standard the project should work to.
Ask 2: what standard is being worked to
A named standard and a level, rather than a general commitment to accessibility. Without a standard there is no way to say whether the site meets anything.
Ask 3: can everything be reached by keyboard
The single most revealing test. Navigating a site without a mouse takes five minutes and exposes most of the serious problems immediately.
Ask 4: do images have meaningful descriptions
For anything conveying information. Decorative images do not need them and informative ones do, and getting this distinction right is most of the work.
Ask 5: is the colour contrast sufficient
For text against its background, including buttons and links. This is measurable, it is a common failure and it affects far more users than people expect.
Ask 6: is information conveyed by colour alone
Error states, required fields and status indicators. Colour with no accompanying text or symbol excludes anybody who cannot distinguish it.
Ask 7: are form fields properly labelled
Programmatically associated rather than visually adjacent. This is the failure that makes forms unusable with assistive technology and it is extremely common.
Ask 8: are error messages accessible
Announced, associated with the field and describing what to do. An error conveyed only by a red border is not an error message for many users.
Ask 9: is the heading structure logical
Used for structure rather than appearance. This is how many users navigate a page and it is frequently broken by styling decisions.
Ask 10: do videos have captions
And transcripts where appropriate. This benefits a considerably wider group than it is usually credited with.
Ask 11: has it been tested with assistive technology
Automated tools catch some issues and miss many. Actual testing, ideally with disabled users, is what establishes whether a site works.
Ask 12: does it work at a phone size with text enlarged
Many users increase text size or zoom substantially, and layouts that break at those settings become unusable rather than merely untidy. Testing a site at two hundred per cent zoom takes a minute and reveals a class of problem that no automated tool reports.
Ask 13: who maintains it afterwards
An accessible site becomes inaccessible through content added without alternative text or headings. Training the people updating it is part of the job.
Answer the accessibility questions before the project starts
An assistant that explains what accessibility involves, what the common failures are and what it means for the build raises a subject clients do not know to ask about, and it should itself be accessible, which is the ground in accessible website assistant. Draft the answers with the ai faq generator, alongside platform choice questions clients overthink, the rescue cases in rescue enquiries from clients with a half finished site, and the practical detail visitors want in service times and accessibility questions visitors ask. See features, start at try, and the sector view sits under web designers.