Treat ADA Accessibility like your guests

The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) mandates that the construction of hotels and other lodging properties includes accessible design requirements. These ADA regulations were designed to protect and support people with an array of disabilities, and still apply today.

Take advantage of your off-season or slow season to ensure all your guests can easily browse and book a stay with your property.

Write this on your to-do list: Add or update the appropriate ADA accessibility features on my booking engine website.

Understand what your website needs to meet ADA requirements

First, you need the images within the website to be accompanied by an alt text equivalent. This requirement is specifically handy for the visually impaired as they can use the "text to speech" function on their computer to interpret the image without having to see it.

An example of using alt text for images on your website would be to add room descriptions to your images in your booking engine:

“Hotel room featuring a king-sized bed, one end table with a wall sconce, a bistro table with two chairs, a coffee table, and beach front accessible.”

Using alt text on images enables guests with visual impairments to understand the room they’re booking. These guests rely on tools that read the contents on the screen to them. Make your brand and unique selling points known on your website.

Imagine your website being full of images that best showcase your property, but your visitor had no idea.

Consider including the Userway ADA accessibility widgets to your website.

These widgets can interpret the photographs, charts, color-coded information, or other graphic elements within the webpage on display.

Userway widget

By using the ADA widget, you make it possible for users to manipulate the color and font settings on their web browsers. The widget makes the web pages more readable.

Many hotel owners will want to include videos and other multimedia on their websites. Videos often lack important accessibility features, and you must consider taking the time to correct this deficiency.

Provide audio descriptions of images and text captions synchronized with the video images to make images, videos, and audio tracks accessible to everyone.

Why does your property need an ADA accessible booking engine?

ADA compliance goes beyond just the known requirements about the physical structure of your hotel.

You are also required to have an ADA-compliant website that is accessible to individuals with disabilities.

Having an ADA-accessible booking engine means that your business aspires to be accessible to everyone.

ADA Accessibility

Make your ADA accessible rooms stand out like your guest reviews

Your website and booking engine should easily display which rooms are ADA accessible, so your guests who need to book those rooms can find them with ease.

Guests should be able to see a symbol on the room they’re booking to indicate if it has accessibility function. Guests should also be able to filter search results for accessible rooms.

Include text and audio descriptions of what is offered in different rooms

For example, in the room descriptions highlight the ADA specific features:

Safety bar in the shower
Safety bar next to the toilet, and raised toilet to minimize falling hazards
Walk in shower with a shower seat
Automatic doors or accessible entrances without stairs
First floor offering near the elevator / entrance
Wheelchair accessible desk, sink, and door handles
Phone available in the room with 911 and front desk calling access

Ask a professional

Ask for professional ADA help and avoid lawsuits

Suppose you want to have your booking engine ADA accessible, but you lack the technical know-how or in-house tech team to handle it for you. In this case, use a professional to implement the principles of accessible design for the internet.

Besides, when you hire a professional, you are sure that the output will be in compliance with WCAG guidelines, thus effectively protecting yourself from potential lawsuits that can be both costly and timely.

Be proactive about this to ensure your property is ADA accessible for all individuals, and to avoid unwanted lawsuits.

Where to look for the best ADA accessible widgets to add to your website

To make sure you have the right set of ADA tools in place here are several widgets in the market that provide a variety of functions, all of which help make websites more accessible.

rezStream uses the popular Userway’s ADA widgets for all its clients. These widgets provide a variety of functions, including keyboard navigation and assistive screen readers.

You can also include widgets that help increase the text size, color contrast, and text spacing to fit the specific needs of the users.

If you would like to learn about how our agency can ensure you meet and exceed ADA requirements, contact us today!

Read our blog How to be ADA Compliant with rezStream to learn how to make your website and booking engine ADA compliant.

Treat ADA Accessibility like your guests