Web accessibility audits against WCAG 2.2 and the EAA.
An accessibility audit tells you which parts of your product people with disabilities cannot use, which WCAG criteria that fails, and what to change. I test by hand — keyboard, screen reader, real pages — not just with a scanner, and I write every finding so a developer can fix it without asking me what I meant. Send me the address and you get a fixed-price quote within 48 hours.
Or write to me directly: audit@pearlyquality.hu
What does an accessibility audit include?
Six things, every time. The quote tells you the scope and the price; this is the work itself.
- A criterion-by-criterion pass against WCAG 2.2 Level A and AA.
- Keyboard-only and screen-reader testing on the real product.
- Every issue reported with severity, failing criterion, location, reproduction steps and a fix.
- A remediation order, so the team knows what to fix first.
- A re-test pass once the fixes land.
- Conformance evidence for an accessibility statement, a VPAT or a procurement questionnaire.
What you do not get is a PDF of scanner output with a logo on it. A tool can tell you an image has no alt attribute. It cannot tell you the alt text says “image1.png”, that the focus ring is invisible against your brand colour, or that your custom dropdown announces nothing at all to a screen reader. Those are the bugs that actually lock people out, and they are found by a person using the product.
The EAA is not a recommendation any more.
The European Accessibility Act — Directive (EU) 2019/882 — has applied since 28 June 2025. It is not a guideline you adopt when there is time; it is law in every EU member state, transposed into national legislation with national enforcement bodies behind it.
In broad terms it covers a defined list of products and services offered in the EU: e-commerce, consumer banking, e-books, electronic communications, passenger transport services, and the self-service terminals around them. Microenterprises providing services are exempt. Whether your specific product sits inside that list is a question worth settling precisely rather than guessing — and settling it is part of the quote, not an extra.
The standard the EAA leans on is EN 301 549, the harmonised European standard for ICT accessibility, which takes its web requirements from WCAG. That is why an audit against WCAG 2.2 Level A and AA is the practical route to EAA evidence: the criteria are the same ones, and the findings map across. If you are also selling into the United States, ADA Title II's web rule carries its own compliance dates in April 2026 and April 2027 for public entities, and the same audit answers both.
I am not a lawyer and an audit is not legal advice. What it is, is the technical evidence your legal and procurement people keep asking you for: which criteria you meet, which you do not, and what remains.
Read the accessibility articles for the long version of any of this.
Is an automated scan or an overlay enough?
| What you are comparing | Automated scan | Overlay widget | A real audit |
|---|---|---|---|
| What it checks | Machine-detectable rules: missing attributes, some contrast, some ARIA misuse. | Nothing. It adds a toolbar on top of the page you already have. | Every WCAG 2.2 A and AA criterion in scope, by hand and by tool. |
| Coverage of real barriers | A fraction. Meaningful alt text, focus order, announcement and error recovery are outside its reach. | None of the underlying barriers are removed. | The barriers people actually hit, because the product is operated the way they operate it. |
| Evidence value | Useful as a regression guard in CI. Not conformance evidence. | Repeatedly cited in complaints rather than preventing them. | Criterion-level findings you can attach to an accessibility statement, a VPAT or a procurement answer. |
| What your team receives | A list of rule violations, often duplicated across pages. | A subscription. | Reproducible, prioritised bugs with a fix for each one. |
| Best used for | Catching regressions after the audit, on every build. | — | Knowing where you stand, and what to do about it. |
Automated checks are genuinely useful — in your pipeline, after the audit, stopping the bugs you just paid to find from coming back. They are a regression guard, not a verdict.
Five steps, no surprises.
- You send the address. The form below takes the URL, how big the thing is, and your deadline if you have one. Two minutes.
- I reply within 48 hours with a fixed price, the exact scope it covers, what is deliberately out of scope, and a date. If I think the scope is wrong for what you actually need, I say so before you pay anything.
- The audit runs. Keyboard, screen reader, automated tooling, and the pages and flows we agreed — on your real product, not a staging copy that drifted.
- You get the report. Every issue with its severity, the criterion it fails, where it is, how to reproduce it, and the fix. Ordered so your team knows what to do on Monday.
- I re-test after the fixes. You find out whether the fix worked before a user does, and you end up with evidence that is current rather than historical.
A practising tester, not a reseller.
I am Imola Mészár. I have spent around fifteen years testing software, and accessibility is the part of it I went deep on: I wrote and teach a WCAG 2.2 course, I publish the accessibility articles on this site, and I make the videos where you can watch a screen reader meet a broken interface. The person who audits your product is the person who wrote all of that. Nothing is subcontracted.
That also sets the price. There is no agency margin, no account manager, and no sales team between you and the person doing the testing — which is why a serious audit here costs less than the brochure version elsewhere.
Start here if you would rather read before you ask: the WCAG 2.2 Level A checklist, what axe-core actually catches, or how to start accessibility testing.
Send the address. Get a price in 48 hours.
Two fields are required: the site and your email. Everything else just makes the quote sharper.
The things people ask first.
What does an accessibility audit include?
A scoped pass against WCAG 2.2 Level A and AA, done by hand as well as with automated tooling: keyboard-only navigation, a screen-reader pass on the real product, and checks that a scanner cannot make — focus order, announcement, error handling, meaningful alt text. You get every issue written up with its severity, the criterion it fails, where it is, how to reproduce it and what the fix is, plus a remediation order, a re-test pass once the fixes land, and the conformance evidence you need for an accessibility statement, a VPAT or a procurement questionnaire.
How much does an accessibility audit cost?
It depends on scope, so there is no list price on this page. Send the address of the site or app and you get a fixed-price quote within 48 hours that names exactly what is in scope, what is not, and how long it takes. Fixed price, not an hourly rate that drifts.
Which standard do you audit against?
WCAG 2.2 Level A and AA. WCAG 2.2 is the current W3C Recommendation, published in October 2023 and updated in December 2024. Where you need European Accessibility Act evidence, the findings are mapped onto EN 301 549, the harmonised European standard for ICT accessibility, which takes its web requirements from WCAG.
Does the European Accessibility Act apply to my product?
The European Accessibility Act — Directive (EU) 2019/882 — has applied since 28 June 2025 to a defined list of products and services sold or provided in the EU, which includes e-commerce, banking, e-books, transport and telecoms services. Microenterprises providing services are exempt. Whether your specific product is in scope depends on what it is and where it is sold, and that is one of the first things the quote settles rather than leaving open.
Is an automated scan or an accessibility overlay enough?
No. Automated tooling reliably catches only a part of the criteria — missing alt attributes, some contrast failures, some ARIA misuse — and is blind to whether alt text is meaningful, whether focus order makes sense, or whether a custom component announces itself. Overlay widgets sit on top of the page and change nothing underneath, which is why they keep appearing in complaints rather than preventing them. Automated checks belong in your pipeline; they are not an audit.
How long does an audit take?
A single flow or a small site is typically days rather than weeks; a larger product is scoped into phases so you get the first findings early instead of everything at the end. The quote gives you a date, and if a legal or procurement deadline is driving the work, say so in the form and the scope is built backwards from it.
Do you fix the issues as well as find them?
The audit hands your developers what they need to fix things themselves: the failing criterion, the location, the reproduction, and a concrete fix. Pairing with the team through remediation, and re-testing afterwards, can be part of the engagement — ask for it in the form and the quote will price it separately so you can see what each part costs.
Who actually does the audit?
Imola Mészár — a practising software tester, not a consultancy subcontracting the work. The same person who wrote the WCAG 2.2 course and the accessibility articles on this site does the testing and writes the report.
Still unsure whether this is what you need? Write to audit@pearlyquality.hu and ask. A two-line answer costs you nothing.