How to Interpret a VPAT

The VPAT requires the vendor to list details about the product, including the name of the product, the date of the report’s creation and the evaluation methods used. A quick assessment of the information here can give you a sense of the quality of the vendor’s approach to accessibility.

• Report Title – In the heading format of “[Company Name] Accessibility Conformance Report”
• VPAT Heading Information – Template version. The current version of the VPAT template is 2.4, which replaced version 2.3 in February, 2020.
• Name of Product/Version – Name of Product being reported, including product version identifier if necessary. Make sure the VPAT you’re evaluating is for the correct product.
• Report Date – Date of report publication. If the VPAT is more than a year old, it’s likely out of date.
• Contact Information – Contact Information for follow-up questions. Ideally this is the person that performed the assessment, like a third party expert or in-house accessibility SME.
• Evaluation Methods Used – A detailed description of evaluation methods used to complete the VPAT for the product. Specificity and robustness are good signs here. “Tested with a screen reader” doesn’t tell us much. “Tested the X user workflow using NVDA screen reader, keyboard and Siteimprove” is much better.
• Applicable Standards/Guidelines – Harvard’s policies indicate adherence to WCAG 2.1 AA. VPATs that are still listing WCAG 2.0 or Section 508 as a standard are likely out of date.

This is the section that documents product compliance with WCAG criteria. Levels of WCAG compliance are divided into separate tables (A, AA and AAA). Each table has 3 columns:

Column 1: WCAG Success Criteria

Each row lists a WCAG Success Criteria. Table 1 includes “A Level” success criteria, followed by AA Level in Table 2.

Source: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1

Column 2: Conformance Level

The vendor indicates the conformance level in the second column with one of the following:

• Supports: The functionality of the product has at least one method that meets the criterion without known defects or meets with equivalent facilitation.
• Partially Supports: Some functionality of the product does not meet the criterion.
• Does Not Support: The majority of product functionality does not meet the criterion.
• Not Applicable: The criterion is not relevant to the product.

Note that if the vendor is marking most rows as “Supports” or “Not applicable,” it could be an indication of a lack of critical thinking about accessibility. We tend to score the vendor who identifies their flaws – and plans for improvement – above those who claim perfection with little to no evidence.

Column 3: Remarks and Explanations

There is a third column that allows the vendor to include notes specific to that criterion and their compliance to it. Ideally each cell in this column is populated with notes, regardless of whether the product supports the Success Criteria or not. An empty Column 3 should be considered a red flag.

Having a VPAT is a good sign, but it doesn’t mean that the “accessibility” box is fully checked. Vendors should be prepared to answer questions about their VPAT.

• What tools or methods were used to complete the VPAT? (If the “Evaluation Methods Used” section was not satisfactory)
• Can your company provide a copy of the accessibility test plan and testing results that were used to complete the VPAT?
• Is there an accessibility roadmap in place to deploy corrective actions to resolve accessibility issues found in the VPAT?

Further questions about VPATs can be directed to digitalaccessibility@harvard.edu