Jurisdictions — Europe
The Dutch regulator checked the biggest webshops for accessibility. Most failed.
The question Dutch-market clients are asking
In March 2026 the Netherlands' consumer authority ACM published something rare: an actual compliance sweep. If you build or maintain webshops serving Dutch customers, this is the data point to show your clients.
What is true, verified
- ACM found the majority of large Dutch webshops inaccessible. In its March 2026 review, the ACM reported that 61% of the largest webshops it examined were not accessible to customers with disabilities (acm.nl). That is a regulator, on the record, naming the gap — not a vendor scare statistic.
- The legal basis is the EAA, transposed into Dutch law. The Implementatiewet toegankelijkheidsvoorschriften producten en diensten brings the European Accessibility Act into Dutch law; in-scope services (e-commerce among them) owe accessibility since 28 June 2025, with the usual microenterprise carve-out (under 10 staff / €2M).
- The benchmark is EN 301 549 / WCAG. Same standard family as the rest of the EU — an audit measured against WCAG is measuring the right thing.
- The public sector has its own track record — and a dashboard. Dutch government sites have been under the Tijdelijk besluit digitale toegankelijkheid since 2018, with public monitoring (DigiToegankelijk). The culture of published compliance status is exactly why the ACM sweep should be taken seriously: in the Netherlands, non-compliance becomes public.
- Language note, honestly: Dutch buyers search "digitale toegankelijkheid", but the Dutch B2B market works comfortably in English — which is why this guide is useful as-is for agencies serving Dutch clients.
How to check a client site yourself
- Accessibility signals: run an automated WCAG checker (axe-core is the open-source standard) on the key templates — home, product page, checkout, contact form. The ACM's findings are exactly the category of mechanical failure automated checks catch.
- Consent posture: load the site cold and watch what fires before consent (GDPR — the Dutch AP publishes enforcement too).
- Broken links and SEO basics: cover the 404s and missing metadata in the same pass.
- Document what you saw: capture the page state behind every finding. An audit that cannot show its evidence is an opinion.
The honest shortcut
We built SiteComply to do exactly that pass — accessibility signals, consent posture, broken links, SEO basics — in a single $29 audit where every finding points to the exact page state we observed. White-label friendly, built for agency portfolios, and it never claims more than it verified.