Document remediation services fix the hidden structure of digital documents so screen readers can read them properly. That means adding tags, setting the reading order, marking up tables, labeling form fields, and writing alt text for images.
The finished file meets Section 508 and WCAG 2.1 AA standards. PDFs are the most common format, but Word files, PowerPoint decks, and ePub files go through the same process.
Visual quality tells you nothing here. A well-designed PDF can be unreadable to a screen reader, because the layer assistive technology depends on is invisible on screen. Document remediation services rebuild that layer.
Why do documents fail accessibility checks?
Most failures trace back to how the file was exported. A PDF saved without tags gives a screen reader no headings, no lists, and no table boundaries, just a flat run of characters. Users cannot navigate it or skip to what they need.
Scanned documents are worse. They contain no text at all, only an image of text, so a screen reader announces an empty page.
Reading order causes subtler problems. Tags often follow the visual layout instead of the logical one, which means a sidebar or a caption gets read partway through a sentence. Tables fail the same way. Without header markup, a reader hears a stream of numbers with no indication of which column or row they belong to.
Forms carry the most legal exposure, since an unlabeled field cannot be completed independently. Worth noting that remediation only serves readers using digital assistive technology. Readers who need physical print require braille translation services, which is a separate process entirely.
What does the document remediation service process involve?
Every file starts with an audit against the applicable standard, which establishes what actually needs fixing. Scanned pages go through OCR first so there is real text to work with.
Tagging comes next. A remediator applies the heading hierarchy, marks lists and tables, then sets reading order explicitly rather than trusting the export. Alt text is written by hand, since a chart needs its data described, not the word “chart.”
Multilingual files need language tags as well. Without them, a screen reader pronounces Spanish text using English phonetics and the result is unintelligible. When the source document still needs converting, our document translation services run first and remediation follows.
Testing closes the loop. Automated checkers routinely pass files that are unusable in practice, so anything we deliver is verified with an actual screen reader. Section 508 guidance sets the baseline federal agencies and their contractors work from.
Where we fit in
Most organizations that contact us are not remediating one file. They have several hundred or several thousand legacy PDFs and a deadline attached. We triage by usage, so the forms people actually open get fixed before the archive does.
Specialists handle manual verification on every file, across 200+ languages, with AI-assisted tagging carrying the repetitive work. If video or live events fall inside the same audit, our ASL and accessibility team covers those.
Get a quote today. Send us a sample file and your document count, and we will scope the work and tell you what your real compliance gap looks like.
