Finland Accessibility Legislation: Scope, Fines & Reporting

Finland regulates digital accessibility through the Act on Accessibility Requirements for Products and Services (568/2023) and the Act on the Provision of Digital Services — Laki digitaalisten palvelujen tarjoamisesta. The regime has been enforced since June 2025, and the most recent amendment to the act was made on 15 March 2019.

Supervision sits with the Finnish Transport and Communications Agency (Traficom), which oversees compliance and can enforce the requirements with fines.

Scope of application

The Act on the Provision of Digital Services defines a broad scope for digital accessibility requirements in Finland. It applies to:

• Digital services provided by public authorities and public law institutions.
• Private entities whose digital service development or maintenance is funded at least 50% by public authorities.
• Online identification and payment services.
• Digital services of public utility companies in sectors such as water, energy, transportation and postal services.
• Financial institutions — including banks, insurance companies and investment firms — offering public services.
• Public-facing services and electronic data transmission, with accessibility standards aligned to WCAG 2.1 Level AA.

Religious organisations, such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church, are subject to separate regulations, while police investigations and preliminary investigations are explicitly excluded.

Exceptions

The act balances its regulatory goals against practical constraints, and carves out specific digital contexts. The requirements do not apply:

• To intranets, extranets and mobile apps intended for limited workplace use — unless they were created after 23 September 2019, in which case certain chapters apply, particularly for public authorities.
• To educational content tied to specific acts, and to temporary education materials used within limited groups.
• To public broadcasters’ services, excluding those providing audiovisual access.
• To real-time media that is not archived.
• To online maps without navigation functions. For mapping services, navigation-related content must ensure essential information is accessible.
• To content not produced, financed or controlled by the service provider.
• To certain cultural heritage works that cannot be modified for accessibility.
• To police investigations and to church-related digital services.

Fines and penalties

The supervisory authority holds the power to enforce compliance with the accessibility requirements through fines, as set out in the Threatened Fines Act (1113/1990). The mechanism is proportionate rather than fixed:

• Fines are discretionary, not a set tariff.
• They are determined based on the nature and extent of the accessibility obligation, the organisation’s ability to pay, and other relevant factors.
• If an organisation fails to address accessibility issues following an order, the supervisory authority can impose a penalty fine to secure compliance.

In practice the mechanism encourages adherence while weighing proportionality and fairness in enforcement — which is why evidence of ongoing remediation matters as much as the fix itself.

Reporting and the accessibility statement

Finland follows the EU-wide mandate for accessibility statements on public sector websites and digital services. These statements are essential for maintaining transparency and accountability.

The statement must follow the format set out in the European Commission’s implementing act and be readily available in an accessible format on the service provider’s website or, for mobile applications, in a way that is accessible during the download process.

The service provider must maintain an accessibility statement that includes at least:

• An explanation of which parts of the content of the digital service do not meet the accessibility requirements, and the reasons for deviating from them.
• Instructions on how the user can obtain the information contained in the digital service, or the service itself, in an alternative way, if the service or part of it is not in a form accessible to the user.
• The service provider’s electronic contact information, to which the service user can send accessibility feedback.
• A link to the supervisory authority’s website, where the service user can make an accessibility complaint or a clarification request.

Complaints

Users who encounter accessibility barriers, or who wish to submit a complaint about non-compliance, can contact the competent authority — the Finnish Transport and Communications Agency (Traficom):

• Email: saavutettavuus@traficom.fi

Getting compliant with QualiBooth

Meeting the Finnish requirements takes two things: evidence that your digital services conform, and a published statement that holds up to scrutiny.

QualiBooth scans continuously against WCAG 2.1 Level AA success criteria, so an order from the supervisory authority never turns into a threatened fine, and manual audits by people with disabilities cover what automation cannot. When it is time to publish, our accessibility statement generator produces a statement with the deviations, alternative-access instructions, feedback route and supervisory-authority link the act requires.

For the latest and most accurate information on Finnish digital accessibility requirements, refer to the official documentation published by the Finnish government.