In February 2026, something unusual happened in a U.S. web-accessibility case: the government stepped in to argue that a $5.15 million settlement was too weak. Not too expensive — too weak. The DOJ (U.S. Department of Justice) told a California federal court that paying out millions while leaving the website essentially unfixed missed the entire point of the law. For Ontario businesses, the case is a clean illustration of a principle that holds on both sides of the border: a cheque, a widget, or a quick patch is not the same thing as an accessible site — and courts are increasingly saying so out loud.
Key facts
- On February 2, 2026, the DOJ filed a Statement of Interest in Alcazar v. Fashion Nova, Inc. urging the court to reject a proposed $5.15 million class-action settlement over a website that blind shoppers said they couldn't use with a screen reader (justice.gov; ADA Title III Blog, Seyfarth Shaw).
- The DOJ's objection was about substance, not money: it argued the injunctive relief would not meaningfully increase accessibility, there was no mechanism to monitor or enforce the fixes, and the attorneys' fees were disproportionate to what class members received (justice.gov).
- In a detail that captures the whole problem, the DOJ noted that the settlement administrator's own claims website — the one blind class members had to use to file a claim — was itself not accessible to screen-reader users (justice.gov).
- The court heard the motion for final approval on February 12, 2026 and held an evidentiary hearing on March 30, 2026 (ADA Title III Blog).
- This sits inside a busy litigation climate: plaintiffs filed 3,117 federal website-accessibility lawsuits in the U.S. in 2025, up 27% year over year (industry litigation trackers) — exposure that reaches any Ontario business selling to American customers under the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act).
What actually happened in the Fashion Nova case?
A blind shopper brought a class action alleging the retailer's website couldn't be navigated with screen-reader technology — a standard WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) failure pattern. The parties negotiated a settlement worth $5.15 million. Ordinarily that's where these cases quietly end.
This time the DOJ filed a Statement of Interest opposing final approval. Its core argument: the deal moved a lot of money but didn't commit the company to concrete, verifiable steps to make the site usable, and it built in no way to check whether anything was actually fixed. The Law Office of Lainey Feingold, a long-time structured-negotiation firm in this space, has tracked the case publicly. The DOJ's position, in plain terms, was that a settlement that pays lawyers and leaves disabled users where they started doesn't serve the people the ADA is meant to protect.
The most quotable piece is the irony: per the DOJ, the website set up to administer the settlement — where blind claimants had to go to get paid — was itself inaccessible to screen readers. It's a small fact that says something large. Accessibility isn't a box you check once and file away; it's a property of every page a real person has to use, including the one you build about accessibility.
Does this lawsuit apply to my Ontario business?
Directly, no — and that distinction matters. The AODA (Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act) has no private right of action, so a customer in Ontario can't bring this kind of class action against you under provincial accessibility law. Ontario's enforcement runs two ways instead: the regulatory compliance-report process, and an individual discrimination complaint to the HRTO (Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario) under the Ontario Human Rights Code. Here's how a single HRTO complaint actually plays out.
The U.S. exposure is the part that crosses the border. If your Ontario business sells to American customers — and most e-commerce stores do — your site is reachable under the ADA, the same statute behind the Fashion Nova case. Why online stores get sued most for accessibility breaks down who's actually targeted and why checkout flows are the common thread.
What's the real lesson for a business owner?
It's the same lesson the FTC delivered when it acted against an accessibility-overlay vendor, and the same one this settlement reinforces from the litigation side: the durable answer is fixing the code, not bolting something on or buying your way out. A widget layered over an unfixed site, or a settlement that pays a claim without remediating the underlying barriers, leaves the actual problem — a person who can't complete a purchase — exactly where it was. Our side-by-side of overlays vs real remediation shows why a JavaScript layer over broken markup doesn't survive contact with a real screen reader, and the 2025 overlay lawsuit data shows that sites running overlays still get sued.
For Ontario, the legal floor is concrete: public-facing websites at organizations with 50 or more employees must meet WCAG 2.0 Level AA under the IASR (Integrated Accessibility Standards Regulation), ahead of the December 31, 2026 compliance-report deadline. Meeting that floor honestly — by testing the flows a customer must complete and fixing what fails — is also what reduces ADA exposure if you sell south. The two goals point the same direction.
What should you do before the deadline?
Start by finding out where you actually stand, then fix the parts that carry real risk: checkout, forms, navigation, and any flow a customer has to finish. Don't certify compliance you haven't verified, and don't assume a third-party widget has handled it for you — the Fashion Nova settlement is a reminder that even purpose-built accessibility infrastructure can fail the people it's supposed to serve. What an AODA audit and remediation actually costs shows where the budget goes when you do it properly.
See what an automated scan flags on your site in about 30 seconds — free PassProof Report: getpassproof.com. It detects overlays, tells you what legally applies in Ontario, and shows where the real gaps are — no scare tactics, just the facts.
PassProof is a remote-first accessibility-engineering studio serving Ontario. General information, not legal advice.