A Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT®) is a template that companies can use to show compliance with accessibility law. Once the template has been filled out, it is referred to as an Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR) and details how the product complies with accessibility law criteria. The official versions of the VPAT® are hosted on the Information Technology Industry Council website.
Vendors
A Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT®) is the industry standard for showing compliance with accessibility law. NIU requires VPAT WCAG.
The templates include detailed instructions. Levels A and AA must be completed. Best practice is to hire an independent accessibility consultant to complete the VPAT for you.
State and federal law require that an equally effective alternative is available until the EIT has been made accessible. You may be asked for an equally effective alternative.
Campus Requestors: Getting an ACR
Many vendors have ACRs for their products on their websites. If not, request one from the vendor. If the ACR is older than version 2.2 or the date is more than a year before, request a more current one.
Here is typical language to use in a ACR request:
Northern Illinois University is purchasing [product name] [vendor's invoice number if available].
As a public university in Illinois, we must comply with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 Refresh and the Illinois Information Technology Accessibility Act 2.0 regarding technology accessibility.
We need an ACR based on a VPAT® 2.2 or higher for our records. In addition to the ACR, we also invite you to share information about planned accessibility improvements for your product (third party certification, usability test results, etc.).
Thank you,
[your name, position, etc.]
Reading an ACR
Having an ACR does not guarantee that a product is accessible. If it includes criteria labeled "Partially Supported" or "Not Supported," then the product is not fully accessible. The report has three columns:
- Each criteria
- If the product meets the criteria
- Remarks and explanations, such as what specifically is an issue, a workaround and a timeline to compliance.
Since NIU is required to meet Level AA criteria, which includes Level A, review the tables for both levels.
You can get an idea of a product's accessibility by checking the following criteria:
- Keyboard (2.1.1): Can someone navigate to every part of the application and participate in every interaction using only a keyboard (not a mouse)?
- Link Purpose (2.4.4): Every link name indicates where it will go (no links with names like "click here," "this" or "more").
- Focus Visible (2.4.7): Is the cursor location visibly located by an outline or underline (as you navigate using Tab, look for cursor indication)?