ADA and Braille Liability

[Fox Stamp Sign & Apparel]

ADA and Braille Signs. Can the sign maker be liable for not having the signs be legally correct? I have a long time customer that is remodeling. This is the first time we are doing ADA signs for them, and they keep saying they don't care if the sign is legally correct or not. Yes, they know they can get in trouble, and they don't care, but can I, as the sign maker, get in trouble?

 

[Johnny Best]

Certain lawyers will go after an establishment for not having correct ADA signage properly displayed.

 

[CanuckSigns]

It takes the same amount of time & materials to make a compliant sign as it does to make a non-compliant sign, why not do it correctly, I'm sure if they got caught the first thing they would say is "that's what the sign guy sold me, he's the expert, not me"

 

[Kev-O-Rama]

My understanding, in Texas, at least, is if an office space is not open to the general public, braille is not legally required. However, if any part of the building is accessible to the public, then ADA compliance, including braille signage, is necessary for those public areas. My general philosophy is you should CYA if possible.

 

[Ssignature]

Mutoh instructed us that the lawyers go after the client but the client goes after the sign shop. Don’t let the client make you produce a non-compliant sign. Download the style sheet and show it to them. Make them sign off on it. Disability activists look for non-compliant signs.

 

[pro-UP]

My understanding, in Texas, at least, is if an office space is not open to the general public, braille is not legally required. However, if any part of the building is accessible to the public, then ADA compliance, including braille signage, is necessary for those public areas. My general philosophy is you should CYA if possible.

ADA tactile and braille signs are required in all permanently designated spaces (even if they do not have a door). Wayfinding signs have a different ADA regulation to follow. By permanent spaces I mean office, breakroom, storage, electrical, etc. However, ballrooms or rooms with a temporary function do not require ADA signs designating the temporary purpose, but will require an ADA sign designating the space. For example, you would definitely designate a ballroom name on the wayfinding package and require a sign which must be ADA compliant in that space.

This includes employee areas. You cannot neglect employee spaces. The laws are for everyone and businesses are liable for not being compliant in all spaces. These are federal laws. They are enforceable in all states. Having provided over 5000 takeoffs to commercial signage clients - here are some of the ones that are ignored and can cause issues. Exit doors do require a tactile and braille exit (no matter what the architect tells you). You are allowed some design and character spacing leeway with this one. Inside your stairwells, there is large sign IBC Fire Code sign with a 5" stairwell landing designation. This sign does not need tactile and braille. Per ADA code your maximum height letter / number is 2". There is a second sign at the stairwell entrance that designates the floor number. Many people combine these signs. Some inspectors don't like this, but this will vary project to project and is often confused.

Make sure you do your research as there are many codes that can cause an inspector to fail these projects.

The best advice I can offer is to always stay on the side of angels. Make the customer aware of these federally mandated laws. If they choose to ignore your advice, make certain you have this documented. Do not argue with them. Provide them exactly what they want. Just make sure you are protecting yourself.

Mutoh instructed us that the lawyers go after the client but the client goes after the sign shop. Don’t let the client make you produce a non-compliant sign. Download the style sheet and show it to them. Make them sign off on it. Disability activists look for non-compliant signs.

They will always go to the source to push the responsibility to someone else. If you are dealing with an inspector that is lenient and doesn't care about the rules, be aware that the next one (maybe they decide to renovate) can demand all the non-compliant signs be pulled and replaced. Another issue - one inspector's approval is not grandfathered. We have seen several projects where a retired inspector rubber stamped inspections and the clients had to do significant overhaul because the new inspector new the codes. This includes mounting locations.

As a final thought, I know that if I couldn't see, it would be nice if the signs were all compliant so I could safely navigate (and maybe not end up in a storage room when trying to exit the building). Sadly most are not. If anyone has questions, feel free to drop me a line.

 

[tulsagraphics]

Follow the specs as outlined by the ADA -- the specs are pretty straightforward. Or just farm it out and call it a day.

And yeah, I get why some clients don't mind cutting corners. A lot has to do with lack of enforcement, and these folks (owners/landlords) simply haven't been fined and/or sued yet. For years we had impaired folks (or disability activists, as Ssignature puts it - I like his phrase better) going all over town looking for anyone/everyone to sue for any/every reason they could find. My old landlord, for example, was sued by a guy in a wheelchair for having a 10 foot stretch of sidewalk that was (ever so slightly) too steep. Ended up costing him $25k to fix it (including the monies paid to a guy in a wheelchair who simply observed the issue, but somehow suffered "emotional distress" because it existed). That same guy sued several dozen owners / landlords over the years. I guess it was a pretty good hustle for him.

IMO, the 'visible' wayfinding is way more important the braille because most visually impaired folks don't know braille or bother learning it -- largely due to advances in technology -- braille is very dated. In all my years I've never seen a single person use braille.
Back in the day we used to bring our ADA signs to various special needs workshops / centers for the blind to make sure our braille was getting translated correctly. After several years we gave up because we couldn't find anyone that could actually read braille. lol. They had too many other gadgets / tech that did all the work.
That's not to say you shouldn't use a proper translator and do everything to spec.... just pointing out that we have to go through a lot of fuss for products that won't likely ever be used for anything more than a regular sign.

Interesting facts from the National Federation of the Blind: Fewer than 10 percent of the 1.3 million people who are legally blind in the United States are Braille readers, and only 10% of blind children even bother learning it.
Source: https://nfb.org/images/nfb/documents/pdf/braille_literacy_report_web.pdf

 

[guillermo]

as far as I know, in California, you file a lawsuit for non braille compliance, they only get $3500, each time, each person that files and that will add up, do the math.

 

[DarkerKat]

Most situations it's the building owner that would be held responsible, not the sign company that produced the product. The owner could turn around and come after the sign vendor, but you can cover yourself pretty easily by having proof in writing that they agreed to non-compliant signage. We do this any time we have a client that asks for non-compliant signs, which is really common unfortunately (especially with large companies, like banks for some reason?)
Like others have mentioned though, unless you want to get into braille signs long term, subcontracting it out saves you the hassle of figuring out a new sign type & having to research local regulations.

Some states *cough cough California* do have a bunch of extra requirements and smaller thresholds. We do braille signage all the time and we're doing our first CA job right now, I swear I have spent weeks reviewing all the extra junk and I'm still paranoid.

 

[StarSign]

The way I understand it is, if it really came down to who's to blame you could technically be a percentage at fault for making a non compliant sign. We have seen a large up tick in inspectors calling out all kinds of stuff lately. Even to the point of adding unnecessary ADA signs. This would be like knowingly selling a customer a 24" stop sign when is should be a 30" (because they think 30" is too big) and then there was an accident. We do alert customers if any of there signs are non compliant and document it.

 

[JBurton]

It takes the same amount of time & materials to make a compliant sign as it does to make a non-compliant sign, why not do it correctly, I'm sure if they got caught the first thing they would say is "that's what the sign guy sold me, he's the expert, not me"

It's usually that they want something that makes the sign noncompliant, like grey background and grey text. In these situations, I draft an email detailing the lack of compliance, and that I'll happily make them noncompliant, as long as they know it's noncompliant, and that if they want compliant signs, that's a different order, please reply 'I understand' if you have read and understand the limitations of the signage being provided. Otherwise, give me a call and we can discuss further.
I had this issue with a customer wanting void cut pictograms for mens/womens bathrooms.

 

[tedshock]

In the past when this occurred with us and the client didn't want to listen to reason, we had a portion of our proofs boxed off in red with white copy saying something to the effect of "signs on this proof do not meet ADA required specs, as requested/instructed by <client's name>", and required a signature under this box, along with the actual signature on the proof. Once they signed off on it, that was enough for us to stave off any liability should something come of it in the future. Most times that was enough to scare a client into doing it right, but we still had some that signed it and didn't care