What is Section 508 Compliance? And Why is it Important?

Millions of Americans have some sort of vision impairment. The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 includes a section that ensures visually impaired individuals have the same access to information and communications as everyone else.

It’s called Section 508, and this portion of the law includes significant implications for health insurers.

Section 508 applies to federal agencies and the businesses that work with them. It requires all parties to create and use information and communications technology (ICT) that meets the needs of the visually impaired and others with disabilities. In our digital world, ICT can include websites, multimedia content, software — and electronic documents like PDFs.

As a health insurer, you’re required to create and send electronic documents to members on a regular basis. Without adhering to Section 508 requirements, you could expose your organization to serious consequences.

Luckily, there’s a technology solution that can help you take healthcare plans to market quickly and without exposure to excessive costs, risk or liability.

Why is Section 508 Important?

Section 508 is most important because it creates an equitable online experience for anyone with a disability.

For example, digital documents must include metatags that make them readable by anyone who is blind or visually impaired. This is especially important for health insurers that are required to publish and share a series of statements, letters, disclosures and other documents for compliance with healthcare regulations.

But Section 508 is also important to your organization for business-related reasons that go beyond equity.

First, Section 508 violations can leave you open to costly fines. The U.S. Department of Justice created a new rule that increased the maximum fine for first-time violators to $75,000. Subsequent violations can lead to fines of up to $150,000.

Second, a lack of accessibility as defined by Section 508 can expose your organization to lawsuits. In recent years, more than 10,000 suits each year are brought against organizations whose websites and applications are not fully accessible to the disabled. And that figure does not include potential cases that were settled by demand letter before becoming official lawsuits.

What Does it Mean to be 508 Compliant?

The nature of your business will determine what 508 compliance means for you. If you create audio or video content, Section 508 compliance would mean creating transcripts or adding closed captioning.

For health insurers, the greatest need is accessibility in digital documents like PDFs. As an insurer, you are required to create and share a wide range of documents with members and prospective members. To remain compliant with Section 508 requirements, these documents must be accessible to disabled members and prospects who are using readers to consume them.

In most cases, accessibility is achieved by adding metatags that make the documents accessible on readers.

What Documents Need to be 508 Compliant?

All digital documents need to be Section 508 compliant. As a health insurer, you’re often sending bills, statements, letters and notices. These documents include CMS-specific information as well as annual notice of changes (ANOC) and evidence of coverage (EOC) letters that are required by other regulations in the industry.

The bottom line is this: If you’re sending it to your members or prospective members, it needs to be Section 508 compliant. Anything less leaves your organization exposed to potential fines and lawsuits.

The Power of Automation in 508 Compliance

Health insurers face a huge challenge in creating documents that are Section 508 compliant (while also adhering to other industry regulations).

Required health insurance documents are highly customized, including benefits information and other details that must be accurate on a member-by-member basis. Ensuring these customized documents are 100% accessible is prohibitively time-consuming and mistake-prone when done manually.

Some health insurers use vendors to add required meta tags after document creation. This approach is expensive, as most vendors charge per page or per word. And this approach also lacks scalability. As the number of documents that need metatags goes up, so too does the amount of time and money associated with using a vendor.

Automation is the only scalable way to generate accessible digital documents.

Instantly Generate Section 508-Compliant Documents

Health insurers can automate the creation of Section 508-compliant documents with Elixir.

Simply create a document template that meets Section 508 requirements one time, and then use that template to generate customized, compliant versions of your documents at the same time you create the normal versions.

This approach is scalable. Create templates just once, and then use them to automatically generate accessible documents whenever needed.

This approach reduces errors. Automation eliminates the errors that even the most meticulous vendor will make.

And this approach accelerates speed to market. Your organization is able to move faster without vendors and manual processes involved in Section 508 compliance.

Learn more about automating accessibility with Elixir.