Accessibility statement

Compliance status

PawMatch is partially compliant with RGAA 4.1 level AA. The latest audit against the 106-criteria grid was carried out on 14 October 2026 by the PawMatch team, using automated tools run in a real browser and a manual review of the pages; it was not carried out by an independent provider.

Compliance rate: 98% (58 compliant criteria out of 59 assessed applicable criteria; 45 criteria not applicable, 2 criteria not tested). This rate covers a sample of 14 public pages, tested in French and in English: home, contact, sign-up, sign-in, forgotten password, e-mail verification, password reset, terms of sale, legal notice, privacy policy, accessibility statement, site map, offline page and 404 error page.

The member area (dashboard, listings, messaging, account) and the administration back office have not yet been audited in a browser: they are covered only by the automated analyses described below, so their compliance rate is not assessed to date.

Checks carried out

These checks are re-run whenever the website changes:

• Automated axe-core analysis (WCAG 2.1 A and AA rules and best practices) of the main screens of the website and the back office, in a browser, in light and dark themes; any serious or critical issue causes the test suite to fail.
• axe-core analysis of interface components (forms, navigation, listings, messaging, account, administration) during unit tests.
• Calculation of the contrast of all colour pairs on the website (text ≥ 4.5:1, components and focus indicator ≥ 3:1) in the three themes (light, automatic dark, chosen dark).
• Static code analysis (eslint-plugin-jsx-a11y rules in strict mode): ARIA roles and properties, alternative texts, form labels, keyboard handling.

Manual and semi-automated checks carried out on 14 October 2026 on the 14 public pages, in French and in English:

• Keyboard-only navigation: full Tab traversal with no trap, a visible focus indicator and an accessible name on every element, and working skip link.
• Adapted display: no horizontal scrolling at 320 px wide, text enlarged to 200% with no loss of content, increased text spacing with no clipping.
• Contrast measured in the browser in light and dark themes (text, field borders, buttons, underlined links in running text).
• Reduced motion: no active animation when the system preference is enabled.
• Structure: a distinct page title on each page, a single level-1 heading, no skipped heading level, landmarks (header, navigation, main content, footer).

Not carried out to date: testing with screen readers (NVDA, VoiceOver), checking of language changes in the English texts (criterion 8.7), validation with the W3C validator, audit of PDF documents.

Accessibility measures in place

• Page language declared (French or English); “Skip to content” link in first position.
• Navigation fully usable with the keyboard; visible focus indicator (3 px outline, contrast of at least 3:1).
• Native modal windows: focus placed in the window, closing with Esc, focus returned to the trigger.
• Form fields with a visible label, with help and errors programmatically associated (aria-describedby), errors announced to screen readers, autocomplete attributes on personal fields.
• Status messages (confirmations, loading, search results) announced by a status region without moving the focus.
• Light, dark or automatic theme, enlarged text size and reduced animations under My account › Display; the system’s “reduce motion” preference is respected.
• Listing photos described or marked as decorative; charts accompanied by a text equivalent or a table.
• Links that open in a new window flagged by hidden text.

Non-accessible content

One criterion is not compliant on the public sample (criterion 8.2, HTML code validity: the code produced by the framework places meta, link and title tags outside the head on some pages, notably the offline page). The following points are also known; they are covered by the action plan below.

Third-party content

Online payment is provided through a page hosted by the payment provider, and the map uses a third-party base map: PawMatch does not control their accessibility.

Action plan

• Audit the member area and the back office in a browser, test with screen readers (NVDA, VoiceOver), then update the compliance rate.
• Fix HTML code validity (criterion 8.2) and check it with the W3C validator.
• Show visually, at the top of each form, that fields are mandatory unless marked “optional”.
• Add arrow-key navigation to the conversations “⋯” menu.
• Provide distinct page titles for each dashboard tab.
• Validate the tagged mating contract with a screen reader and a PDF/UA tool.
• Aim for the WCAG 2.2 level AA criteria (minimum target size, focus appearance).

Feedback and contact

If you cannot access content or a service, you can write to us through the contact form on the website. Please state the page address, the problem encountered and, if possible, your browser and assistive technology. We undertake to reply within 5 working days.

Means of redress

If you notice an accessibility defect that prevents you from accessing content or a feature of the website, you have reported it to us and you do not receive a satisfactory reply, you can write a message to the Défenseur des droits (the French Defender of Rights) or send them a letter by post.

• Online form: https://formulaire.defenseurdesdroits.fr/
• Call 09 69 39 00 00 (Monday to Friday, 8:30 am to 7:30 pm, local call rate).
• Free post, no stamp needed: Défenseur des droits, Libre réponse 71120, 75342 Paris CEDEX 07.