But here’s the catch: if they’re part of your user experience and you serve EU customers, you’re responsible for making sure they meet the accessibility requirements of the European Accessibility Act.
Third-party tools and EAA compliance: who’s responsible? (Spoiler: you are)
Using third-party tools—like live chat, payment systems, or booking engines—is standard practice. But under the European Accessibility Act (EAA), just because you didn’t build it doesn’t mean you’re off the hook.
If a tool is part of the user experience on your site or app, it needs to be accessible. That includes anything your customers interact with: overlays, pop-ups, cookie banners, maps, and even your video player.
But wait—doesn’t the vendor handle that?
You’d hope. But in practice, many third-party tools don’t meet accessibility standards out of the box. And if something isn’t accessible, your users won’t care whose fault it is—they’ll just hit a wall. And legally? That’s on you.
Even though you didn’t build the tool, you’re the one delivering the experience. If that experience excludes people, the responsibility (and risk) sits with your organization.
What to watch out for
Here are some red flags when it comes to third-party tools:
- Keyboard traps or no keyboard access at all
- Unlabeled buttons or icons (especially in embedded widgets)
- Content that disappears or becomes unreadable on screen readers
- Poor contrast, hover-only content, inaccessible CAPTCHA, the list goes on…
What you can do about it
- Choose your tools wisely: Ask vendors for accessibility statements or VPATs. If they can’t give you one, that’s a clue.
- Bake accessibility into procurement: Make it part of your contracts and selection criteria.
- Test the tools yourself: Run them through accessibility testing just like the rest of your site.
- Give users a way to report problems: And act on that feedback.
Silktide can help
Our platform flags accessibility issues across your whole site—including the bits you didn’t build. We’ll help you spot non-compliant third-party content, understand what’s going wrong, and know what to fix (or when to push back on a vendor).
You’re still responsible for the full experience. But you don’t have to do it alone.
Free accessibility checker in your browser
Our free accessibility checker tests any web page for over 200 WCAG issues, and gives you straightforward, step-by-step guidance on how to improve your web accessibility. Available on Chrome and Edge.
