Got an ADA website accessibility demand letter? Practical next steps for small businesses

A letter or email says your website isn't accessible to people with disabilities and asks you to fix it, pay, or both. It can feel urgent and scary. This page covers the practical, technical side: what to keep, what not to do, and how to find and fix the real barriers on your site. It is not legal advice. For the legal side, talk to a lawyer licensed in your state, ideally one who has handled ADA or accessibility matters.

1. Don't ignore it, and don't panic

Read the whole letter and write down any date or deadline it gives. Keep the original (paper, email and envelope or headers). Check who sent it: a real law firm or advocacy group can be looked up, and your state bar's lawyer referral service can help you find a lawyer to review it. Many lawyers will tell you in a short first call how they usually handle these.

2. Don't reply, pay or promise anything before you get advice

What you say in writing can matter. Let a lawyer decide how and whether to respond. Don't edit or delete the letter, and don't quietly take the website down without advice, since that can raise its own questions and hurts your business.

3. Don't rush to install an overlay widget

Accessibility overlay toolbars are often sold as a quick answer to letters like this. They don't fix the underlying code, and many disabled users and experts criticise them. In 2025 the US Federal Trade Commission fined overlay maker accessiBe $1 million over claims that its tool could make any website compliant. Read overlays vs real fixes first.

4. Record what your site looks like today

Before anyone changes anything, save dated evidence of the pages the letter mentions: screenshots, the page addresses, and the results of a free automated check. This gives your lawyer and your web person the same starting point, and it lets you show later what you changed. A simple log works:

Date        Page                       Issue found                          Status
2026-11-02  /book-online               Form fields have no labels           Fixed 2026-11-04
2026-11-02  / (home)                   Hero image has no alt text           Fixed 2026-11-03
2026-11-02  /menu                      Menu is an image-only PDF            In progress
<!-- example log; record your own pages, dates and fixes -->

5. Find the real barriers on the pages it names

Letters often name a few problems, such as images without alt text, forms that can't be used with a keyboard, or low-contrast text. Check those first, then the pages customers use most: home, contact or booking, menu or services, and checkout. Do three quick tests yourself:

1. Use only Tab, Shift+Tab, Enter and Space to reach and submit your main form. Can you always see where you are?
2. Run a free automated checker on each key page and write down what it finds. See free checkers compared.
3. Zoom the browser to 200% and check nothing is cut off or overlapping.

The W3C has a short guide to easy checks for a first review, and the US Department of Justice publishes plain-language guidance on web accessibility and the ADA.

6. Fix the code, not just the symptoms

Most common problems on small-business sites are quick to fix once you know where they are: add alt text to meaningful images, give every form field a visible label, use real text instead of text inside images, fix colour contrast, add captions to videos, and replace image-only PDFs with web pages or tagged PDFs. Our checklist and platform guides for Wix, Squarespace, WordPress and Shopify show how. Booking, payment and chat widgets are the vendor's code, so ask the vendor for their accessibility conformance report (a VPAT).

7. Know what automated tools can and can't tell you

Automated checkers, including ours, find only part of the barriers on a page: things like missing alt text, unlabelled fields, low contrast and missing page language. They can't judge whether alt text makes sense, whether a form is usable with a screen reader from start to finish, or whether a PDF reads in the right order. For a complex site, an app or a checkout, a manual audit by an accessibility specialist is worth asking about. No tool or report can make a site "compliant" or end a claim by itself.

8. Plan to keep it fixed

New pages, photos and plugins bring new problems. Add a short accessibility check to your routine whenever you publish, and consider a factual accessibility statement with a way for visitors to report barriers. See keeping a site accessible over time.

Common mistakes

• Ignoring the letter until a deadline passes.
• Replying or paying before talking to a lawyer.
• Installing an overlay toolbar and assuming the problem is solved.
• Fixing only the one page named and leaving the same issue on every other page.
• Not keeping a dated record of what was found and what was fixed.

Where the Fix-Pack fits

If you want a fast, written starting point for your web person and your lawyer, the $149 Fix-Pack scans up to 10 pages you choose, ranks every issue the automated scan finds, and gives copy-paste fixes for your platform within 48 hours, with one re-scan so you can show what changed. The report is dated, so it can sit in your fix log. It doesn't replace legal advice or a manual audit, it doesn't resolve a letter, and it doesn't protect against claims. Start with the free homepage snapshot to see what kind of issues it finds.

Related: does my small business website need to be accessible?, hiring someone to fix accessibility, what an accessibility audit costs.

This is general technical guidance, not legal advice, and it doesn't certify compliance with the ADA or any law, or protect against claims.

Want to keep a dated record of your fixes and re-tests? See the website accessibility fix log guide.

Related guides

• European Accessibility Act (EAA) for US small businesses: does it apply and what to check
• Embedded form accessibility: Google Forms, Jotform, Typeform and other form builders
• Visible focus and skip links: the two keyboard fixes most small business sites need
• Animations, background video and motion: making a moving website comfortable for everyone

All guides

This guide is general technical information, not legal advice. Following it does not certify ADA or any legal compliance. Automated checks find only part of accessibility barriers.

Check your own site, then decide

1. Free homepage snapshot. Your top 3 issues in about a minute. No signup, no card.
2. $149 Fix-Pack, if you want the full list. Up to 10 pages scanned, issues ranked by impact, copy-paste fixes for your platform, delivered within 48 hours, plus one re-scan after you apply them.

Get my free snapshot Order the Fix-Pack – $149

14-day refund promise. See a sample report first. A technical report, not legal advice; automated checks find only part of accessibility barriers.