When you start working through the nuances of the European Accessibility Act (EAA), not everything is completely clear. We recently created a report for a client and wanted to address one potential source of confusion.
First let’s start with this:
There isn’t a massive 2030 deadline where all existing products have to be EAA compliant. There is a 2030 deadline, but it’s only for products used in the provision of services.
Okay, but what are products used in the provision of services?
And, secondly, what are services?
Well let’s look to the services definition first (and, by the way, remember that in the context of this article, this is only for services covered by the EAA). The EAA doesn’t provide much help here, referencing us out to another Directive:
Article 3 Definitions:
‘service’ means a service as defined in point 1 of Article 4 of Directive 2006/123/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (27);
Okay, so now let’s go to 2006/123/EC, Article 4 Definitions:
‘service’ means any self-employed economic activity, normally provided for remuneration, as referred to in Article 50 of the Treaty;
Not that helpful, but we continue on — what are products used in the provision of a service?
Let’s look to the Directive to 1) solidify that these products are covered by the 2030 deadline and 2) find out what these products are.
Recitals paragraph (19):
In order to ensure the accessibility of the services falling within the scope of this Directive, products used in the provision of those services with which the consumer interacts should also be required to comply with the applicable accessibility requirements of this Directive.
Recitals paragraph (101):
In order to allow service providers sufficient time to adapt to the requirements of this Directive, it is necessary to provide for a transitional period of five years after the date of application of this Directive, during which products used for the provision of a service which were placed on the market before that date do not need to comply with the accessibility requirements of this Directive unless they are replaced by the service providers during the transitional period. Given the cost and long life-cycle of self-service terminals, it is appropriate to provide that, when such terminals are used in the provision of services, they may continue to be used until the end of their economic life, as long as they are not replaced during that period, but not for longer than 20 years.
Article 32: Transitional measures
1. Without prejudice to paragraph 2 of this Article, Member States shall provide for a transitional period ending on 28 June 2030 during which service providers may continue to provide their services using products which were lawfully used by them to provide similar services before that date.
2. Member States may provide that self-service terminals lawfully used by service providers for the provision of services before 28 June 2025 may continue to be used in the provision of similar services until the end of their economically useful life, but no longer than 20 years after their entry into use.
Alright, that’s all well and good and the caveat for self-service terminals is really helpful, but what exactly constitutes a product used in the provision of a service? As far as we can tell there is only one example provided in the Annex II, titled, “INDICATIVE NON-BINDING EXAMPLES OF POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO MEETING THE ACCESSIBILITY REQUIREMENTS IN ANNEX I”
The Example:
In Section III (Examples related to services), under “The provision of services,” the example appears as:
(vii) When a service provider offers a USB-key containing information about the service, providing that information is accessible.
Section III is specifically about “General accessibility requirements related to all services covered by this Directive in accordance with Article 2(2)”
The section begins:
“The provision of services in order to maximise their foreseeable use by persons with disabilities, shall be achieved by: (a) ensuring the accessibility of the products used in the provision of the service”
So this USB-key example falls under subsection (a) – products used in the provision of the service.
This is a useful, logical example, but we wish there were more.
If you’d like assistance with EAA compliance, we’d love to help. Just send us a message and we’ll be with you shortly.
