The European Accessibility Act will reshape how banks and fintechs design their services—whether they’re ready or not.
In an office in Vilnius, a team of fintech developers scrolls through a wireframe of a sleek new payments app. The colour palette is minimalist, the layout intuitive. But one question has yet to be answered: can a blind customer use it? Until now, the answer has too often been ‘no’. That is about to change.
From June 28, Europe’s financial services providers will face a new legal imperative. The European Accessibility Act (EAA), a sweeping piece of legislation first adopted in 2019, will finally enter into force. Its goal is to ensure that key goods and services, from e-books to ATMs, websites to mobile apps, are accessible to people with disabilities.
For the fintech sector, this is not just a matter of compliance—it’s an operational and strategic pivot.
Levelling the interface
The EAA brings long-overdue clarity to what ‘accessible’ means in the digital age. In financial services, this encompasses mobile banking apps, online portals, customer authentication methods, and ATMs.
Interfaces must now work seamlessly with assistive technologies such as screen readers, voice navigation, and alternative input devices. Content must be perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust.
For a sector built on agility, the directive may feel burdensome. Fintechs—many of which pride themselves on design and speed—now face the prospect of retrofitting interfaces, reworking code, and redesigning UX around accessibility standards.
And many appear to be unready to meet the challenge.
A sector failing to meet the grade
A study by TestDevLab, a Riga-based software quality assurance provider found that only 31 per cent of Europe’s largest 100 fintechs fully meet basic web accessibility requirements regarding keyboard navigation and focus visibility.
The study reviewed the home pages of multiple banking and fintech companies to ascertain if users can navigate them only using a keyboard—a basic requirement defined by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.
The analysis focused on things like how easy it is to move around the page, if each element that receives keyboard focus has a visible focus indicator so that users can understand where they are, whether there are any issues with focus moving to invisible elements, if the keyboard allows users to move through the page in a logical order, and if users can easily close any content that appears over the keyboard focus, such as website popups.
The requirements were partially met by 51 per cent, while the remaining 18 per cent could not be analysed due to various reasons.
Fintech for all
“Financial service products should be accessible to everyone, but our study demonstrates that this is still far from the case,” says Elīna Šiškeviča, digital accessibility testing department lead at TestDevLab.
“An inclusive internet environment is not only a basic right, but it also drives business, who stand to access a wider userbase by making their websites accessible. As we prepare for the EAA to come into force, businesses who begin to think about this now will benefit twofold—from the peace of mind that compliance brings, but also from the immense benefit and profit opportunity.”
Indeed, with one-in-four Europeans reporting web accessibility limitations, the opportunity for forward thinking fintechs is clear.
One study has shown that accessibility and user improvements can significantly boost a company’s revenue, bringing back approximately 90 euros for every one euro invested. Despite that, many websites do not meet even the basic accessibility standards.
With fintech companies on the cutting edge of technology while simultaneously offering financial services, their ability to ensure accessible online experiences is crucial to foster financial inclusion.
However, with 70 per cent of fintech platforms failing to meet basic accessibility requirements, people with disabilities are being marginalised, contributing to a widening tech accessibility gap.
Making apps easier to navigate, payments simpler to initiate, or verification processes more intuitive can only broaden reach. For a sector addicted to user growth, accessibility is a largely untapped frontier.
The next wave of European fintechs will be those that embed inclusivity into their core offering, not as a late-stage patch but as a founding principle. In a competitive landscape, accessibility may soon be as important as fees, features, or even funding.
Photo: Dreamstime.
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