In today’s increasingly digital world, organizations are facing a growing imperative to ensure that their documents are accessible to all users, regardless of their abilities. This is not only a matter of social responsibility but also a legal requirement in many jurisdictions. An Enterprise Document Accessibility Platform (EDAP) can be a powerful tool in helping organizations meet these challenges.
What is an Enterprise Document Accessibility Platform?
An Enterprise Document Accessibility Platform is a comprehensive solution that encompasses all the essential components required to make customer communications accessible, compliant, and usable in an enterprise environment. To successfully address the accessibility challenge, it typically includes a suite of software tools, services, and support that can help organizations:
- Content Accessibility. It should help you find, test, and fix the content on your websites, repositories, and archives including PDF and MS-Word documents.
- Automated Document Accessibility. It must provide an automated process for creating accessible digital documents from your transactional applications.
- Support for All Document Types: The platform must support making all types of documents (static, transactional, and hybrid) accessible.
- Outsource When Needed. The platform should allow you to outsource the creation of alternate formats such as braille and large print, as well as outsourcing the remediation of complex or high-volume documents.
Benefits of an EDAP
The benefits of implementing an Enterprise Document Accessibility Platform are numerous and far-reaching, these include:
- Reduced risk of legal and regulatory penalties. By making public-facing documents fully compliant, you reduce the risk of regulatory fines and lawsuits.
- Improved customer satisfaction. Accessible and usable documents improve customer satisfaction.
- Increased productivity. Faster time to market means critical documents can be delivered more quickly.
- Cost Savings. You achieve cost savings by having a single solution for all accessible document creation, eliminating duplicate work.
- Predictable Costs. Future-proofing your system guarantees predictable costs in the long run.
- Enhanced brand reputation. By investing in document accessibility, organizations can improve their bottom line, attract and retain top talent, and create a more positive and productive work environment.
Requirements for an EDAP
Before implementing an Enterprise Document Accessibility Platform, it’s crucial to understand your organization’s specific requirements. Here are some key considerations:
- 100% Compliance. It should achieve 100% compliance with accessibility standards.
- Document Conversion. The platform must convert all documents into accessible formats usable by all readers.
- Document Types. It should support all document types used for communication.
- Future-Proofing. Be committed to supporting evolving accessibility standards and provide a seamless transition to new standards.
- Transactional Document Support. Offer a verified solution for generating accessible transactional documents in high volumes.
- Static Document Support. Offer a verified solution for generating accessible static documents.
- AI Functionality. Use AI to minimize setup and ongoing costs.
- Offer various solutions, including on-premises, cloud-based, services, or a fusion of these options.
Unique Requirements for Transactional Documents
Transactional documents are those that are generated automatically by an organization’s systems, such as bills, statements, and invoices. These documents can be particularly challenging to make accessible because of their complex formatting and dynamic nature. An EDAP should have the following capabilities for handling transactional documents:
- On-Request, Real-Time, Remediation. Ability to provide on-request remediation and batch processing.
- Handling Historical Documents. Capability to handle both day-forward and historical documents.
- Efficient Remediation. Ability to handle high volumes of data efficiently, including data validation, transformation, and enrichment.
- Rules-Based Templates. A streamlined workflow with rules-based template creation for processing large volumes.
- WCAG, PDF/UA, HHS Compliance. Ability to deliver full compliance in any transactional and static workflow.
- Compliance Testing. Ability to automatically test and validate all accessible documents generated to ensure compliance.
Unique Requirements for Static Documents
Static documents are those that are manually created, such as brochures, reports, and presentations. These documents can be made accessible using a variety of tools and techniques. An EDAP should have the following capabilities for handling static documents:
- Website Scanning. Ability to scan websites for PDF and MS-Word files and test them for compliance.
- AI-Powered Remediation. An easy-to-use remediation tool powered by AI to handle large numbers of PDF files.
- Outsourcing Remediation. Capability to outsource remediation when there’s a backlog of inaccessible documents.
- Document Repository Scanning. Ability to scan document repositories and validate document accessibility.
- LMS Document Scanning. Scanning documents in Learning Management Systems (LMS) to ensure compliance.
Meeting the Requirements with AccessibilityNow®
Crawford Technologies’ AccessibilityNow® is a comprehensive EDAP that meets all of the requirements listed above. It is a proven solution that is used by many of the world’s largest organizations. AccessibilityNow® includes the following components:
- AccessibilityNow® Solutions CrawfordTech document accessibility solutions.
- AccessibilityNow® Transactional for the remediation of large volumes of transactional documents.
- AccessibilityNow® DocMD Web Accessibility for scanning and remediating websites.
- AccessibilityNow® Transactional for converting transactional documents into accessible formats.
- AccessibilityNow®.com Self-Service Portal for users to upload ad hoc documents for remediation.
- AccessibilityNow® Services for training, consulting, and remediation outsourcing.
In conclusion, an EDAP can be a valuable asset for organizations that are committed to making their documents accessible to all users. By implementing an EDAP, organizations can reduce their risk of legal and regulatory penalties, improve customer satisfaction, increase productivity, and enhance their brand reputation.
Crawford Technologies’ AccessibilityNow® is a comprehensive EDAP that can help organizations meet all their document accessibility needs.
To learn more about CrawfordTech’s robust and complete solution, visit our EDAP page, and register for our webinar on November 28, 2023 at 1PM ET on Enterprise Document Accessibility Platforms.
