With the end of the year approaching, I was doing some tax prep. I asked the Windows version of Copilot to convert a final pay summary from my last employer into something that was more readable. To Copilot’s credit, it converted the PDF into a highly accessible Excel spreadsheet. That’s the positive. It is really handy.
Unfortunately, that’s not the full story. In reviewing the conversation, here is how the entry providing my answer reads with a screen reader. Note this is just the start of the answer.
CopilotNative.Chat.Controls.ViewModels.MessageThinkingAndActivityPartCopilotNative.Chat.Controls.ViewModels.MessageDocumentPartYour Excel spreadsheet is ready to go — you can **click the card above to download it**.
I have to ask why this sort of a basic accessibility failure is still making it to customers. Both automated and manual testing could easily find this sort of a failure and likely basic code inspection and automated checking as well at the code level.
People who do not use screen readers would never be shown text like CopilotNative.Chat.Controls and the rest of the long string those of us who do use such technology are offered. This is simply not acceptable.
Sadly, this is still far too often the reality of accessibility though in 2025. It is part of why I wrote my post on Accessibility island years ago at https://theideaplace.net/accessibility-island-the-journey-of-many-experienced-as-one/. It is also why I say the accessibility field, especially at the corporate level, needs to be far more accountable. I wrote about this also at https://theideaplace.net/from-word-fluff-to-real-impact-achieving-specific-measurable-and-accountable-accessibility/.
Some accessibility is more complex to address but these sorts of issues are not. All it takes is commitment and attention to the most basic of details.
If you try to reproduce this, the issue seems to occur when Copilot is producing downloadable content. Of course, the Windows Copilot app still serves at best half an answer to screen reading users in my opinion in general.
Yes, it is true that AI, as with many technologies, has done many innovative things for accessibility. But the full story should be positive, not just the innovations. These tools still need sizable attention because the basics of accessibility within many of these tools still falls short.
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