BelgiumElectronic Communications Act, Article 121/4(3) to (7), and the Royal Decree of 13 September 2023, accessibility requirements for electronic communications services (Law of 20 July 2023)
Loi du 13 juin 2005 relative aux communications électroniques article 121/4, §§ 3 à 7, inséré par la loi du 20 juillet 2023, et Koninklijk besluit van 13 september 2023 tot vaststelling van de voorschriften en nadere bepalingen inzake toegankelijkheid voor personen met een handicap tot elektronische communicatiediensten
archived copy
Read from a public archive copy, not the publisher directly. The publisher does not serve this page to automated readers, so a direct fetch was not an option here; how we access sources. Archived 2025. Publisher's page: https://www.ejustice.just.fgov.be/eli/loi/2005/06/13/2005011238/justelIn force since .
An accessibility requirements rule binding public and private bodies.
What it requires
- If you provide electronic communications services, Article 121/4(3) to (7) of the Law of and the Royal Decree of apply to you from (Article 121/4(3) of the Law and Article 7 of the decree).
- Design your electronic communications services in accordance with the accessibility requirements and make them accessible to end users with disabilities (Article 121/4(3)).
- Give information on how the service works, its accessibility features and its interoperability with assistive devices through more than one sensory channel, make your websites, related online applications and mobile device services, including mobile applications, perceivable, operable, understandable and robust, and provide technical support that gives accessibility information through accessible communication methods (Article 3 of the Royal Decree of ).
- Offer real-time text in addition to voice communication, and total conversation where you provide video in addition to voice (Article 4 of the Royal Decree of ).
- Describe the service in accessible formats, justify how it meets each requirement of Articles 3 and 4, state that information in your general terms and conditions or an equivalent document, and keep it for as long as the service operates (Article 5 of the Royal Decree of ).
- The requirements do not apply to transmission services used to provide machine-to-machine services (Article 121/4(4)).
- Enterprises with fewer than ten employees and an annual turnover or annual balance sheet total of at most EUR 2,000,000 that offer electronic communications services are exempt from the requirements and from all obligations relating to compliance with them (Article 121/4(5)).
- The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change resulting in a fundamental alteration of the nature of the service and does not impose a disproportionate burden under the criteria the King fixes; assess this, keep the evidence and results for five years after the service was last provided, give the Institute a copy of the assessment on request, and renew the assessment for each category or type of service when the service changes, at the Institute's request, and at least every five years (Article 121/4(6)).
- You cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive public or private funding, other than your own resources, to improve accessibility (Article 121/4(7)).
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text.
If you get it wrong
Penalty structure
Under Article 21(5) of the Law of the Council of the Institute may impose an administrative fine of up to EUR 5,000 on a natural person and of up to 5% of the offender's consolidated turnover, before tax and excluding VAT, in the electronic communications or postal sector in Belgium in the most recent full financial year, or up to EUR 1,000,000 on a legal person with no turnover; the base is Belgian sector turnover, not worldwide turnover. It may add a periodic penalty payment of up to EUR 500 a day (natural person) or 5% of daily turnover a day (legal person), with no total cap stated. Where those measures do not remedy the breach, Article 21(6) doubles the maximum amounts and percentages, and Article 21(7) lets the Council, for a serious or repeated breach, also suspend the provision of the service or product concerned.
- Rule
- Turnover pct only
- As of
- Turnover percentage cap
- 5
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
The Belgian Institute for Postal Services and Telecommunications (BIPT/IBPT), which checks compliance with the Law of and its implementing decrees (Article 14(1), point 3, of the Law of ) and whose Council imposes the measures and fines of Article 21 of that Law
What it reaches
Instrument type
an act of a legislature
Applicability criteria
Article 121/4(5) exempts those enterprises from the requirements and from all obligations relating to compliance with them.
- As of
- Combinator
- All of
- Criteria
- provides electronic communications services, other than transmission services used to provide machine-to-machine services (Article 121/4(3) and (4))
- is not an enterprise with fewer than ten employees and an annual turnover or annual balance sheet total of at most EUR 2,000,000 (Article 121/4(5))
What this law does
Article 1, second paragraph, point 7, of the Electronic Communications Act states that the Act partly transposes Directive (EU) 2019/882.
Article 4(1) of the Directive requires Member States to ensure that economic operators only provide services that comply with the accessibility requirements in its Annex I. Article 121/4(3) requires providers of electronic communications services to design the services in accordance with accessibility requirements and make them accessible to end users with disabilities. Article 121/4(3) leaves it to the King to fix the accessibility requirements and procedures.
The Royal Decree of on accessibility for persons with disabilities to electronic communications services, made under Article 121/4, enters into force on . Article 3 of that decree requires the provider of electronic communications services to give information on how the service works and on its accessibility features through several sensory channels.
Article 3, point 2, of that decree requires websites, related online applications and mobile device services, including mobile applications, to be made accessible by making them perceivable, operable, understandable and robust. Article 3, point 3, of that decree requires technical support that gives information, through accessible communication methods, on the accessibility of the service and its compatibility with assistive technologies.
Article 4 of that decree requires real-time text in addition to voice communication, and total conversation where video is provided in addition to voice. Article 5 of that decree requires the provider to describe the service in accessible formats and justify how it meets each requirement of Articles 3 and 4. Article 5(2) of that decree requires that information to be stated in the general terms and conditions or an equivalent document and kept as long as the service operates.
Article 6 of that decree sets the criteria for assessing a disproportionate burden, among them the ratio of the net costs of compliance to the provider's net turnover. Article 121/4(4) excludes from the requirements the transmission services used to provide machine-to-machine services. Article 121/4(5) exempts micro-enterprises that offer electronic communications services from the requirements and from all obligations relating to compliance with them.
Article 121/4(6) applies the requirements only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change that fundamentally alters the nature of the service and does not impose a disproportionate burden on the provider. Article 121/4(6) requires providers to assess whether compliance would impose a fundamental alteration or disproportionate burden, to keep the evidence and results for five years, and to give the Institute a copy of the assessment on request.
Article 121/4(6) requires providers to renew the assessment for each category or type of service when the service changes, at the Institute's request, and at least every five years. Article 121/4(7) bars a provider that receives public or private funding for accessibility from relying on the disproportionate burden defence. Article 2, point 1, defines the Institute as the Belgian Institute for Postal Services and Telecommunications.
The Law of inserted Article 121/4(3) to (7), and the Justel consolidation records that it applies from . A royal decree laying down the rules and detailed provisions on accessibility for persons with disabilities to electronic communications services is among the measures that Belgium notified for Directive 2019/882.
Article 14(1), point 3, of the Law of on the status of the regulator of the Belgian postal and telecommunications sectors charges the Institute with checking compliance with the Law of and its implementing decrees. Article 21(5) of the Law of lets the Institute's Council, on finding a breach, order it to end, prescribe how it is to be remedied, and impose an administrative fine, with separate maximums for natural and for legal persons.
Article 21(5) of the Law of also lets the Council impose a periodic penalty payment for each day of delay in complying with its decisions. Article 21(6) of the Law of doubles those maximum amounts and percentages where the measures taken have not remedied the breach.
When LexLint raises it
When your app profile says your app ships a consumer interface, ships a mobile app or provides telecom services.
Back to the example · Lint your app
Page updated .