A person sits and holds their white cane In 20% of the digital barriers described, participants reported that they were unable to resolve the barrier and did not complete the task they were attempting. For example, when shopping online, some participants ended up buying nothing because they could not access the information they needed to make informed product choices. Seventeen of the barrier descriptions involved situations in which participants began the process of buying an item online, ran into digital barriers, and aborted the purchase. This negatively impacts businesses as well as potential customers. One participant simply wrote, “In general if I can’t get quality information on a product, I just won’t buy it.”

Finally, in 7% of the barrier descriptions, participants could not complete digital tasks as planned but found an alternate way to do what they needed to do. For example, some participants booked travel or obtained financial or health information via phone. One participant had trouble navigating a popular food delivery app, so they decided to just pick the first restaurant in the list instead of browsing and choosing their preferred restaurant. Such workarounds took extra time, reduced participants’ access to information, and compromised participants’ flexibility and choice.

In 20% of the digital barriers described, participants reported that they were unable to resolve the barrier and did not complete the task they were attempting.

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