Accessibility fines in Europe: what each country can charge your online shop

Who has to comply

Companies that sell products or services to consumers online in the EU. Microenterprises are exempt for services: fewer than 10 employees and an annual turnover or balance sheet of no more than €2 million. If your company is larger, the rules apply to your website, your app and your checkout.

Maximum fines, country by country

These are the ceilings set in national law, not typical amounts. Authorities usually start by ordering you to fix the problems by a deadline; fines come when that order is ignored.

1. Germany: up to €100,000 for offering a service that does not meet the requirements, and up to €10,000 for other violations (§ 37 BFSG).
2. Sweden: a sanction fee from SEK 10,000 to SEK 10,000,000 (section 39 of the Accessibility Act, SFS 2023:254). The regulator, PTS, can also attach a conditional fine to an order.
3. Spain: from €301 up to €1,000,000, depending on how serious the violation is.
4. Luxembourg: €15,000 or €500,000 depending on the violation, and up to €1,000,000 for repeat offences.
5. Belgium: up to €200,000.
6. The Netherlands: up to €103,000 for some of the supervisory authorities.
7. Austria: up to €80,000 for severe violations, with lower amounts for minor ones and reduced fines for small companies.
8. Italy: from €5,000 to €40,000 for serious violations.
9. France: up to €7,500 for a company, and up to €15,000 for a repeat offence.
10. Ireland: a criminal offence. Up to €5,000 or 6 months in prison on summary conviction; up to €60,000 or 18 months on indictment. Directors and managers can be held responsible too.
11. Norway (not in the EU, own rules): private businesses must already meet 35 WCAG 2.0 criteria, and the authority can impose daily fines. In 2021 the University of Bergen received a daily fine of NOK 150,000.

Sources: § 37 BFSG, Swedish Accessibility Act, SFS 2023:254, Fieldfisher overview, May 2025, Mason Hayes & Curran on the Irish rules, and our page on the Norwegian rules. Laws change, so check the current text for your country.

Fines are not the only risk

In Germany, the first warning letters from lawyers (Abmahnungen) reached online shops about six weeks after the law took effect, with a disputed value of €10,000, as Heuking reported in August 2025. Competitors and consumer groups can act faster than any authority.

In France, disability organisations took Carrefour to court. In June 2026 the court in Caen ordered the company to make its website and app fully accessible within six months, or pay €500 for every day of delay. We wrote about the case in our article on choosing an audit.

And the starting point is low. A study of 2,446 German online shops in November 2024 found that about 99% did not meet the requirements, as Computerwoche reported.

What actually protects you

No widget and no certificate. What counts is a site that people can actually use with a keyboard, a screen reader and zoom, and an honest accessibility statement. A sensible order:

1. Find out where you stand: check the home page, a product page and checkout.
2. Fix what blocks people from buying first: checkout, forms, navigation.
3. Publish an honest accessibility statement and a way to report problems.
4. Re-check after the fixes and after major changes to the site.

How we can help

We are a small web studio in Lviv, Ukraine, and every check is done by hand. Start with a Quick Check for €99: three pages, the 10 most important issues, a report in English within two working days. If you then order a full accessibility audit (from €590), the €99 is deducted. After the audit we can write your accessibility statement (€290) and re-check the fixes (from €190).

This article is general information, not legal advice. For a decision about your company, talk to a lawyer in your country.

Read also

• Buying an accessibility audit? Seven questions to ask before you pay
• The European Accessibility Act is in force. Here is what an online shop actually needs to do