Code de la consommation, accessibility requirements for services: duties of service providers (transposition of Directive (EU) 2019/882)

Article 4(5) of Directive (EU) 2019/882 exempts microenterprises providing services from the accessibility requirements referred to in paragraph 3 of that Article and any obligations relating to compliance with them. Article L412-13 of the Code de la consommation requires economic operators to provide services that meet the accessibility requirements set by a joint order of the ministers for the economy and for persons with disabilities.

Article 16 of the Act of 9 March 2023, which inserted Article L412-13, applies it to services provided after 28 June 2025. Article D412-50 applies the section to electronic communications services other than machine-to-machine transmission, services giving access to audiovisual media services, the listed elements of air, rail, bus and coach, metro, tram, trolleybus and inland waterway passenger transport services, consumer banking contracts and services, and e-commerce.

Article D412-50 lists metro, tram and trolleybus services with the other passenger transport services whose listed elements it covers, and does not carry the limitation in Article 2(2)(c) of the Directive of urban, suburban and regional transport services to interactive self-service terminals.

Article D412-50 does not apply the section to the following content of websites and mobile applications: pre-recorded time-based media and office file formats published before 28 June 2025, online maps whose essential information is available in accessible digital form, third-party content not funded, developed or controlled by the operator, and archives. Article D412-57 requires service providers to design and provide services in accordance with the accessibility requirements of the arrêté.

Service providers set out the information explaining how the services meet the accessibility requirements in accordance with the annex, make it available to the public in written and oral form including in an accessible way, and keep it as long as the service is available.

Service providers ensure that procedures are in place so that the provision of services stays compliant, and take account of any change in the service, in the requirements or in the harmonised standards or technical specifications against which conformity is declared.

Where a service is non-compliant the provider takes the corrective measures needed and informs the market surveillance authorities of the Member States where it provides the service, giving details of the non-conformity and of any corrective measure taken. On a reasoned request of the market surveillance authorities, service providers supply all the information needed to show that the service conforms and cooperate in any measure to bring it into conformity.

Article 8 of the arrêté requires websites, including related online applications, and mobile device services, including mobile applications, to be made accessible in a consistent and appropriate way by making them perceivable, operable, understandable and robust.

Article 8 of the arrêté also requires support services (help desks, call centres, technical support, relay services and training services) to give information on the accessibility of the service and its compatibility with assistive technologies through accessible modes of communication.

For electronic communications services, including emergency communications, Article 9 of the arrêté requires real-time text in addition to voice, total conversation where video is offered, synchronised emergency communications, and support for communication adapted to aphasia.

For services giving access to audiovisual media services, Article 9 of the arrêté requires perceivable, operable, understandable and robust electronic programme guides, information on the availability of accessibility features, and full transmission of subtitles, audio description, spoken subtitles and sign language interpretation, synchronised with sound and video and adjustable by the user.

For passenger transport services, Article 9 of the arrêté requires information on the accessibility of vehicles, surrounding infrastructure and the built environment and on assistance for persons with disabilities, and information on smart ticketing systems and real-time travel information.

For e-commerce services, Article 9 of the arrêté requires accessibility information on the products and services offered when the responsible operator provides it, and accessible identification, security and payment functions. Article D412-58 treats services that comply with the accessible-information requirements of the EU passenger rights regulations as conforming to the accessibility requirements.

Article D412-59 presumes services that conform to harmonised standards, or parts of them, whose references are published in the Official Journal of the European Union to meet the accessibility requirements, to the extent those standards cover them. The last paragraph of Article L412-13, I exempts the microenterprises that provide services from the accessibility requirements and from all the obligations tied to them.

Article D412-50-1 defines a microenterprise as the enterprise defined in Article 3 of the Directive. The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change amounting to a fundamental alteration of the nature of the service, and does not impose a disproportionate burden on the economic operators concerned.

A service provider relying on the disproportionate-burden defence renews its assessment for each category or type of service when the service is altered, when the inspecting agents so request, and in any event at least every five years. An operator that receives public or private funding from sources other than its own resources to improve the accessibility of a service cannot rely on that defence for the service.

Service providers may continue to provide their services, until 28 June 2030, using products they lawfully used to provide similar services before that date. Service contracts concluded before 28 June 2025 may continue unmodified until they end, and at the latest until 28 June 2030.

Self-service terminals lawfully used before 28 June 2025 may stay in use for similar services until the end of their economically useful life, which may not exceed fifteen years from entry into service, and their renewal must secure a balanced territorial distribution. Article 32(2) of the Directive lets Member States allow such terminals to stay in use no longer than 20 years after their entry into use.

Article 16 IV of the Act adds to Article L1112-1 of the Code des transports that access to air, rail, bus, coach, metro, tram, trolleybus and inland waterway passenger transport services is ensured in particular by the accessibility of self-service terminals and service elements, in the manner provided in Article L412-13.

Article 16 V of the Act also amended point p of Article L33-1 of the Code des postes et des communications électroniques, which subjects the provision of electronic communications services to the public to rules on access for deaf, hard-of-hearing, deafblind and aphasic end users to an offer of electronic communications services at no extra cost to them that includes a simultaneous written and visual translation service for calls made and received.

That offer also meets, for calls made and received, the accessibility requirements of Article L412-13. Article 2 of the decree amends Articles D98-8-1 and D98-8-3 of that Code, which concern the national relay centre.

Article L511-25-1 gives the agents of ARCEP the power to investigate and record infringements for electronic communications services, and the agents of Arcom the same power for the services of the publishers and distributors of audiovisual communication services giving access to audiovisual media services.

Those agents, with those of the ACPR, the AMF and the Banque de France for banking services, have the powers of section 1 and subsections 1 to 5 of section 2 of chapter II of title I of book V, and may apply the measures of Article L521-1 and of subsection 2 of section 2 of chapter I of title II of that book.

Those powers include entering premises used for professional purposes and places where a service is performed between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m., and at other hours when the premises are open to the public. They also include requiring the communication of documents of any kind, copying them or seizing them. Where documents exist in computerised form, the agents have access to the software, the stored data and the algorithms.

To check the supply of services on the internet the agents may use a borrowed identity. Where proof cannot be established otherwise, the agents may reveal their capacity only when they inform the person inspected of the finding of an infringement. Where a service does not comply with the regulation made under book IV, the agents may order it brought into conformity within a period they set, which may extend to the products and equipment made available to consumers in the service.

In case of grave or immediate danger the administrative authority may suspend the service by arrêté until it complies. After adversarial proceedings the agents may enjoin a professional to comply within a reasonable period and attach a daily periodic penalty of at most EUR 3,000, the total liquidated being at most EUR 300,000.

Article R451-4 punishes with the fine for contraventions of the fifth class a service provider that designs or provides services whose accessibility obligations are not met, or that fails to establish, make public or keep the required information, to inform the authorities, or to supply the information and documents showing conformity. Article R451-4 provides that repeat offending is punished under Articles 132-11 and 132-15 of the Code pénal.

The fine for contraventions of the fifth class is at most EUR 1,500, a ceiling that Article 131-13 of the Code pénal raises to EUR 3,000 for a repeat offence where the regulation so provides. For a legal person already finally convicted of the same fifth-class contravention within a year, the maximum rate is ten times the natural-person rate, which gives EUR 15,000.

Arcom takes complaints about services giving access to audiovisual media services through its contact form, by selecting the subject accessibility of programmes. Article D412-50-1 defines a service provider as any natural or legal person who provides a service on the Union market or offers to provide a service to consumers in the Union.