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Web site owners stand to lose billions of pounds worth of business if they fail to tackle basic accessibility problems, according to research from technology access charity AbilityNet ( http://fastlink.headstar.com/ability1 ).

The charity surveyed the internet habits of 100 people with disabilities including vision impairment, and found that they tended to go to mainstream web sites for information, shopping, banking and leisure rather than to web sites specifically focused on their disability. The top ten most popular web destinations cited were the BBC, Nationwide
building society, Google, eBay, Amazon, the Guardian and Times newspapers, Lastminute.com, Premierleague.com and Yahoo.

A major factor in these choices is greater accessibility of these web sites compared with their rivals, said the report. The survey found that many web sites are inaccessible due to basic design flaws. Typically, the size of text cannot be adjusted, images are not labelled properly, and animations are used extensively

Web site owners who are complacent about these issues risk losing valuable business to their rivals, according to the report's author Robin Christopherson. "These potential internet users represent a spending power in excess of 120 billion pounds. The arguments are compelling. Whether from a moral, legislative or commercial perspective, suppliers of goods, services and information on the internet are ignoring a highly significant market sector at their peril," he said.

• Possible Legal Implications Otherwise
  
• Possible Financial Benefits
  
• It's the Right Thing To Do