Why California sees the most website accessibility claims

What it is

The Unruh Civil Rights Act guarantees full and equal access to the accommodations and services of all business establishments in California. It provides for statutory damages, and a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act is also a violation of the Unruh Act under California law.

Does it apply to you

• Your business operates in California, or serves California customers through a website.
• A claim is brought by an individual. Unruh creates a private right of action, which is the mechanism behind most website accessibility filings in the state.

What being wrong costs

Because an ADA violation is independently an Unruh violation, a single inaccessible website can support claims under both federal and state law at once. Unruh provides for statutory damages per offense, meaning a claimant does not have to prove financial loss. This combination is the reason California accounts for a disproportionate share of website accessibility claims nationally. The specific amounts and the circumstances in which a reduced figure applies are matters for a lawyer.

What it demands

• In practice, the same thing the ADA does: a website that people using assistive technology can actually use, assessed against WCAG.
• Evidence that the assessment happened, and when.

What WebSpark does

• Every page is tested against WCAG 2.2 AA before it publishes, and the result is recorded with a date.
• Barriers reported by a visitor are triaged and fixed, and the fix is recorded, which matters where a claimant alleges a known and unremedied barrier.

What you can show

• A dated, continuous accessibility record rather than a single audit.
• A published accessibility statement with a route for reporting a barrier.

What stays yours

• Any decision about responding to a demand letter or a filing. We can produce the technical record; whether and how to respond is a legal question.