Scoring a VPAT

Score VPATs to compare two or more products

Overview

Choosing the most accessible digital products or services requires reviewing and comparing the accessibility documentation provided by the vendor. This may be useful while doing initial shopping for digital products or services, or for determining finalists during an RFP process.

Common accessibility documents include:

• Higher Education Community Vender Assessment Toolkit (HECVAT)
• Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT)
• Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR)

Below is a lightweight method of determining the more accessible product among multiple options using the VPAT/ACR.

VPAT scoring tally sheet

This VPAT Scoring Tally Sheet is a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet created to simplify this process.

To use the tally sheet, enter your score for each success criterion, as described below. The calculations needed will be performed by the sheet.

Scoring method

This method starts by scoring the success criteria listed in the Medium-level review of a VPAT, Stage 1.

For each success criterion, review the Conformance Level and Remarks and Explanations columns. Assign the following points based on support level:

• Supports: 2 points
• Partially supports: 1 point
• Does not support: -1 point
• Not applicable: 0 points

On the Stage 1 tab, the spreadsheet will add up the total number of points and multiply by 4 to determine the base score for each product.

Compare Stage 1 scores

Products with higher scores are more accessible than products with lower scores.

• If the highest scoring product's score is 12 or more points above the next highest scoring product, choose the highest scoring product.
• If products with the highest scores are within 12 points of each other, follow the instructions below to score additional success criteria.

Rename and save the spreadsheet to document your scoring work.

Score additional success criteria

The additional success criteria to score are listed in Medium-level review of a VPAT, Stage 2.

1. Using the same point scale found under Scoring method, assign points to each of the success criteria in this document.
2. On the Stage 2 tab, the spreadsheet will add up the points for the new success criteria. It will also add the new Stage 2 total to the previous Stage 1 total.
3. Choose the product with the highest score.

If two products are still score tied after Stage 2, save the spreadsheet to clearly document that work, and then you may use the other requirements and features to determine the final choice.