Accessibility requirements suitable for public procurement of ICT products and services in Europe (EN 301 549)
‘EN 301 549’ is a comprehensive and detailed technical standard. It was produced jointly by the European Committee for Standardization (CEN), the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization.(CENELEC), and the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI). It has direct applicability to EU member countries, but can be adopted by other countries and organizations outside of the EU.
The Standard describes how various types of mainstream Information and Communications Technology (ICT) should behave in order to be accessible to people with disabilities. It also describes over-arching functional performance criteria that apply to all ICT. It covers websites, electronic documents, telecommunications devices, software, public-use devices, and more.
The primary target audience for this document is product designers, developers and testers. Having the requirements defined allows a secondary target audience, public procurement policymakers, to reference these standards in their activities. Referencing the standards provides buyers and vendors a shared language and common understanding of what is considered to be ‘accessible’.
There are associated training and toolkit materials available. These materials can help those who work in related aspects, even if they consider themselves to be ‘non-technical’. Procurement personnel, marketing and sales personnel, managers, and others may find it beneficial to first consult these related ‘Understanding and Implementation’ resources, which are provided in the next Section(s) of this Portal.