Understanding the compliance and process of IAAP Accessibility Audit

Source: www.freepik.com

On 31st July 2025, SEBI vide its circular SEBI/HO/ITD-1/ITD_VIAP/P/CIR/2025/111 has mandated that the digital platform of SEBI registered intermediaries must be accessibility compliant as per RPwD Act, 2016 and rules made thereunder.

With this circular in place, Research analyst are required to get their digital platform audited from a IAAP certified accessibility auditor. Digital platform includes website as well as mobile application of research analyst.

This circular has received resistance from most of the intermediaries due to less availability of IAAP certified auditors as well as the high cost associated with accessibility audit.

Later SEBI has has extended the timelines via circular SEBI/HO/ITD-1/ITD_VIAP/P/CIR/2025/131 dated 25th Sep 25. The revised timelines are as follows

Compliance requirements	Deadline for submission
REs shall submit a list of digital platforms provided by them for the investors	Sept 30, 2025
Appointment of IAAP certified accessibility professionals as Auditor	Dec 14, 2025
Conduct of Accessibility Audit for the digital platforms	April 30, 2026
Remediation of findings from the audit and ensuring compliance with this circular.	July 31, 2026
Annually give compliance to conducting annual accessibility audits of all the digital platforms and submit final report of such audit to SEBI	April 30, 2027

As per the above timeline table, the research analyst are required to appoint the IAAP certified accessibility professionals as auditor and report the same to BSE. It is the upcoming compliance requirement

Given the short supply of IAAP certified auditors and huge costs involved with accessibility audit, there is vague knowledge of accessibility audit and steps involved in it.

Compliancify Consulting has worked in last 3 months with experts in this field and understood the process which involves three primary steps. Compliancify consulting insights will help you understand the accessibility audit process in detail.

Step 1: Accessibility Audit

The accessibility audit starts with reviewing of the digital platform ( Be it website or mobile application). The accessibility auditor along with its team of experts in this areas conducts a thorough check of digital platform. Each page of website/ mobile app is checked in detail for accessibility. It involves checking of elements on page like text content, images, PDFs, audio/video etc. Every element of page has its own requirements regarding accessibility apart from browser environment, website flow and the codes of website.

Once the website/ Mobile app is reviewed, the auditor prepares a report of areas/ elements where the platform is not compliant as per accessibility standards.

Step 2: Remediation Process

Once the report is prepared under step 1 which lists down all the elements/ pages where the corrective or remedial action is required. The Auditor along with team of developers start to correct the website through deploying right tools, correction of backend code and deploying accessibility elements.

Remediation is the most important step for the website/ mobile application to become compliant. Preferably, it must be done only by firm or auditors who have conducted the accessibility audit otherwise there will be communication gap between audit findings and correct remediation.

Step 3: Certification process

Post remediation or after all the remediation steps are completed, the website/ mobile application is checked again for accessibility standards. If the auditor is satisfied that now the website/ mobile application is as per accessibility standard, The auditor issues a final certificate signed by IAAP certified professional. The certificate is valid for one year from date of certificate.

The Cost of IAAP audit

The IAAP audit cost can be huge. Therefore we suggest you to keep your website light and free from unnecessary elements and pages. The more number of pages or elements on the website/mobile application can increase the cost of audit and remediation significantly.

We hope that this article would help you to understand the process of accessibility audit and steps involved in it. Compliancify Consulting has worked with IAAP auditors in last 3 months and developed insights and domain knowledge. Compliancify Consulting also has tied up with IAAP auditors and can help getting the accessibility audit at discounted fee. Get in touch to know more.