VPAT Remediation
Accessibility
Collaboration
Overview
Accessibility at Cvent is an ongoing effort, that includes continuous staff education and auditing current products. I was part of Round 1 VPAT, completed in May 2023 which aimed compliance with WCAG 2.1 AA standards for the attendee-facing event registration webpages created in the Cvent platform.
Approach
I collaborated closely with the QA and engineering to understand the issues identified in the VPAT and vet solutions enabling an accessible experience while maintaining or improving usability.
Duration
6 months
106
Total tickets
100
Tickets with UX input
8
New tickets by UX
Why accessibility?
28.7% of adults in the United States have a disability, according to the CDC. Disabilities can include visual impairments, cognitive impairments, physical impairments, and hearing impairments. Our mission is to enable everyone to be able to register and understand the event information.
Process
I consulted on the overall user experience and usability as the QA and the engineering team were working on the issues. After a month it became obvious that a lot more UX input was needed and I started working more closely with the SDET, where we tested together and discussed what is configurable (and therefore the planner's responsibility) and what was not. We kept a detailed documentation of each issue tested, with the result and recommendation. After the engineers' works was done, we tested the solution to ensure it met Level AA guidelines.
Outcomes
The majority of the issues were planner configurable, which meant that our user already had the capability to make contrast ratis accessible, and for these defects I verified and provided an explanation.
The bread and butter of the VPAT were issues that could be easily fixed. For these, we tested the fixes and how they fit with the overall usability.
And lastly, there were some issues that required a thorough change in the components and very high level of effort. For these, we added a recommended product design modification, and discussed with the PM.
In the process of VPAT, I discovered a few additional accessibility issues not marked in the VPAT, for which I made 6 new tickets to address things such as
Highlight: Attendee Table
Problem 1 - Reflow
The Attendee table failed WCAG 1.4.10 - Reflow. The rule requires that content be usable without loss of functionality or scrolling in both horizontal and vertical directions at a viewport width of 320 CSS pixels.
While the content reflowed, some functionality was not available at the small screen size (equivalent of 400% zoom on a 1280px wide screen).
Solution
To remediate the issue, I proposed adding back the sort functionality, along with labels for the user data when displayed on a 320px wide viewport.
Problem 2 - Decorative Attendee Images
The attendee profile images in the table are decorative but were not hidden from screen reader users (WCAG 1.1.1). The assistive technology was reading out the initials, or the image file name because the "alt" attribute was missing. We added an explicit empty alt
Additional usability and UI improvements suggested, such as a uniform attendee image size, centered initials, and a wider space to show the information.