EU Accessibility Act disproportionate burden decision

Create this record only after confirming that the product or service is covered by Directive (EU) 2019/882 and that a specific Annex I accessibility requirement is being assessed. The decision should identify whether the issue is a fundamental alteration of the product or service's basic nature, a disproportionate burden, or both.

The Directive narrows the outcome: requirements still apply to the extent they do not create the fundamental alteration or disproportionate burden. The record therefore needs to state which accessibility requirements remain fully applicable and which requirement is limited.

Annex VI makes the assessment evidence-based and product- or service-specific. It requires three comparisons: net compliance cost against overall operating and capital costs; estimated operator costs and benefits against the estimated benefit for persons with disabilities, taking account of amount and frequency of use; and net compliance cost against net turnover. The Directive sets no fixed percentage at which burden becomes disproportionate, so a ratio alone does not decide the result.

A useful decision table has one row per accessibility requirement being limited. Each row should include the requirement, proposed accessibility work, one-off organisational costs, ongoing production or development costs, benefit assessment, turnover or overall-cost ratio, conclusion, and remaining accessibility measures.

Article 14 requires economic operators to document the assessment and keep all relevant results for five years from the last making available of a product on the market or after a service was last provided, as applicable. Authorities can request a copy of the assessment.

For products, the Article 14 analysis should sit with the technical documentation because Annex IV says the technical file must be able to demonstrate that relevant accessibility requirements would introduce a fundamental alteration or disproportionate burden when Article 14 is relied on. A microenterprise dealing with products is exempt from documenting the assessment, but it must still carry out the assessment and provide the relevant facts if a market surveillance authority requests them.

Service providers relying on disproportionate burden must renew the assessment for each category or type of service when the service changes, when the service-compliance authority requests renewal, and at least every five years. Product records should also be ready for market surveillance review when Article 14 is relied on.

Market surveillance authorities and service-compliance authorities can check whether the Article 14 assessment was conducted and whether the Annex VI criteria were used correctly. Keep the review log as part of the evidence.

Close the decision with an outcome for every assessed requirement: fully implement; implement a narrower accessible measure and document the residual limit; or do not rely on Article 14 because the evidence does not establish disproportionate burden. Name the approving economic operator, decision date, authority-notification status, implementation owner, and next reassessment date.