BFSG Accessibility for WooCommerce — accessibility information (Informationen zur Barrierefreiheit) and a WCAG check of the checkout

BFSG Accessibility for WooCommerce is a plugin for shops covered by the German Barrierefreiheitsstärkungsgesetz (BFSG). Since 28 June 2025 the law applies to e-commerce services provided to consumers, and a shop has to publish “Informationen zur Barrierefreiheit”: how the service meets the accessibility requirements (§ 14 (1) no. 2 BFSG together with Annex 3). The plugin does two things: it helps you write and publish this information, and it checks the pages that matter most — cart, checkout, product page — against WCAG.

What it does not do: it adds no overlays, toolbars or “accessibility buttons” to the storefront, and it does not make a shop accessible by itself. It shows where your theme and plugins have barriers; the fixes belong there. The evaluation in the information is your own statement, and the plugin’s report is marked plainly as “kein Zertifikat”. Micro-enterprises — fewer than 10 employees and a turnover or balance sheet total of up to EUR 2 million — are exempt from the accessibility requirements for services (§ 3 (3) BFSG). The plugin is for the shops the law does cover, and for agencies that look after several of them.

What the shopper sees

For the shopper nothing changes: no panels, no plugin scripts, no pop-ups. The only new thing is the “Informationen zur Barrierefreiheit” page, easy to find through a footer link or your own menu. It is built from headings and lists and passes the check itself: axe in the browser on the information page — 0 violations; at 390 and 320 px long German words such as “Marktüberwachungsbehörde” wrap without horizontal scrolling.

With Pro, visitors see the information in their language (German or English) with a switch to the other one, and the “Barrieren melden” form lets them report a barrier: errors appear as a summary with links to the fields, and there is no CAPTCHA — a hidden field, a signed timestamp and a rate limit keep bots out.

What the admin gets

The menu WooCommerce → BFSG Accessibility, seven tabs: “Overview”, “Accessibility information”, “Check the shop”, “Barrier reports” (Pro), “History” (Pro), “Settings”, “Licence” — in English or German, depending on the admin language. Until the information is published, the admin shows a notice with a “Remind me in 14 days” button.

The information. The form follows Annex 3 no. 1 a–d: a general description of the service; how a purchase works — the plugin fills in from WooCommerce whether guests can order and which payment methods are active; how the requirements are met — the benchmark (EN 301 549 V3.2.1 = WCAG 2.1 AA or V4.1.1 = WCAG 2.2 AA), the result of your evaluation (met in full, in part or not), method and date, accessibility features, known limitations, alternative ways to get in touch. Then the contact for accessibility questions and the market surveillance authority: prefilled with the joint authority of the German federal states, MLBF (Carl-Miller-Straße 6, 39112 Magdeburg, e-mail), from its official website. The phone number is left empty on purpose — the MLBF website announced a number change; check the authority details before you publish. Optionally, a sentence on the consumer’s right to apply to the authority (§ 32 BFSG). The “Create the page” button creates the page with the shortcode, and a switch in the settings adds a link to it in the footer.

Checking the shop. On the “Check the shop” tab pick the pages and screen widths and click “Run the check”. The pages open in a frame of the admin page — as you see them while logged in — and are checked in your browser with axe-core 4.13.0 against WCAG 2.1 or 2.2, Levels A and AA, plus the rules written for WooCommerce. For cart and checkout the plugin puts one product in your own cart and removes it after the run. Every finding carries a severity, a WCAG criterion and an EN 301 549 clause.

WooCommerce checklist. 23 items (20 for WCAG 2.1) on what automation cannot see: can a purchase be made with the keyboard alone, is the focus visible, are errors and cart changes announced, do payment widgets work with a screen reader, does anyone have to type the same address twice. Every item has “how to check”. A failing item with a public explanation goes straight into “Bekannte Einschränkungen” (known limitations) of the information. If you choose “erfüllt” (meets the requirements) while the checklist or the scanner show failures, the plugin warns you in red.

Keeping it current. The law requires changes to the service to be taken into account (§ 14 (3) BFSG). The plugin records theme switches and theme, plugin and WordPress updates since the last review and reminds you to review the information at an interval you set (12 months by default).

Pro: for those who run several shops or expect an authority request

Pro checks the whole page sample described in BFSG Annex 1 in one click: home, shop, category, search, “Mein Konto” as a guest sees it, contact, AGB, Datenschutz, the barrier report form and the information page — and the admin stays logged in after the run. “History” keeps every run and shows what is new and what was fixed. The printable or PDF “Audit report” and the CSV bring together the benchmark, the dates, the manual checklist and the latest automated runs — for when the authority asks for information (§ 14 (5)). For agencies there is export and import of settings, information and checklist as JSON, and reminders and change digests can go to several recipients.

How it works — step by step

1. Install the plugin — nothing changes on the storefront, WooCommerce → BFSG Accessibility appears in the admin.
2. Fill in the form on the “Accessibility information” tab; part of the purchase description comes from your WooCommerce settings.
3. On “Check the shop” run the check of cart, checkout and product page on desktop and at 320 px — results mapped to WCAG and EN 301 549.
4. Go through the checklist by hand: keyboard, focus, errors, payment widgets. Failing items with a public explanation go into the known limitations.
5. Choose the result of your evaluation — the plugin warns you if it contradicts the findings — and publish the page with “Create the page”.
6. From then on the plugin records theme and plugin updates and reminds you to review the information when it is due.

How much it costs

Pro is 990 UAH, a one-year licence. A year of updates, technical support and all Pro features. You can take a longer term straight away — the longer, the cheaper per year:

• 1 year — 990 UAH
• 2 years — 1,880 UAH (−5%, 940 UAH per year)
• 3 years — 2,610 UAH (−12%, 870 UAH per year)
• 4 years — 3,250 UAH (−18%, 810 UAH per year)
• 5 years — 3,710 UAH (−25%, 740 UAH per year)

No automatic charges: you renew by hand, and reminders come by e-mail. A purchased licence keeps the Pro features for good — when the term ends, the shop only stops getting new versions and support. One key, one domain.

Trial first, then pay. The 7-day Pro trial starts with the “Try Pro free for 7 days” button on the “Licence” tab; the key comes by e-mail, no card needed. When the trial ends only the Pro features switch off; the information and the base check keep working.

Under the hood

• axe-core 4.13.0 by Deque — unmodified, under the MPL-2.0, in vendor/axe-core/. The 580 KB file loads only in scan mode for an admin with a nonce and the manage_woocommerce capability; visitors never get it.
• Rules written for WooCommerce: autocomplete tokens of the address fields (WCAG 1.3.5) on classic and block checkout, required fields exposed to assistive technology, shop messages outside a live region, controls without a visible focus change, a missing “same address” option (3.3.7), CAPTCHAs (3.3.8), third-party payment frames the automated check cannot look into.
• Mapping of every finding to its WCAG criterion and EN 301 549 clause (9.x): 50 A+AA criteria in WCAG 2.1, 55 in WCAG 2.2.
• Data stays on your server: check results in the plugin’s own table, barrier reports (Pro) too, with name, e-mail, page and message.
• Deleting the plugin leaves the data by default; with define( 'CCBF_DELETE_DATA', true ); in wp-config.php the tables and options are removed. The information page stays as ordinary site content.

How to install

1. Download catcode-bfsg-accessibility-for-woocommerce-1.0.0.zip with the button at the top of this page: Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin → Install → Activate. It is the same archive as for Pro: Pro switches on with a key or the trial.
2. WooCommerce → BFSG Accessibility → “Accessibility information”: fill in the form, check the MLBF details and click “Create the page”.
3. “Check the shop”: run the check and go through the checklist. Choose the result of your evaluation by what you actually checked.
4. “Settings”: turn on the footer link (or add the page to your own menu) and set the review interval.
5. For Pro: paste the key from the e-mail after payment, or click “Try Pro free for 7 days” on the “Licence” tab.