How much does PDF remediation cost?
Manual PDF remediation typically costs $5 to $15 per page, paid once per document. Automated services that create accessible HTML versions cost $0.30 to $0.75 per page per year, and cover the documents you post next week too.
Calculate your cost
| Option | Cost |
|---|---|
| Manual remediation, once | $25,000 – $75,000 |
| DocAccess, per year | $3,000 – $3,750 |
| Paridoc, per year | $1,500 – $2,250 |
Manual: $5–15 a page. DocAccess: $0.60–0.75 per page per year, the rates implied by agreements public agencies have published. Paridoc: $0.30–$0.45 per page per year.
Don't know your page count?
Most agencies don't, and most underestimate it. Agendas, minutes, budgets, permits and reports pile up for years. One California county's website we looked at links to more than 26,000 document addresses. Send us your website's address and we'll count your PDFs and pages for you.
What drives the cost of manual remediation
Manual remediation means a specialist opens each PDF and tags it: marks headings, sets the reading order, writes descriptions for images, and rebuilds tables so each cell is tied to its headers. The price per page depends on how much of that a page needs:
- Plain text pages are fastest, near the bottom of the range.
- Tables, such as budgets and fee schedules, take the longest to tag correctly.
- Forms need every field labeled.
- Scanned pages have no text at all until someone runs OCR and checks it.
- Charts and maps need written descriptions.
Then there's the bill nobody quotes: every document you post after the project ends. A city council that meets twice a month posts dozens of agenda packets a year, each with its own attachments.
Manual remediation vs. an automated service
| Manual remediation | Automated HTML version | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $5–15 per page, once | $0.30–0.75 per page per year |
| New documents | Each one is a new job | Included |
| Turnaround | Days to weeks | Minutes |
| What you get | A tagged, accessible PDF | An accessible HTML version; the PDF is unchanged |
| Staff work | Sending files out, checking them back in | Adding one script tag |
Manual remediation still has its place: when the PDF file itself has to be accessible, because you send it out as an attachment or a rule requires tagged PDFs. For documents people read on your website, an accessible HTML version costs a fraction as much. More on this in manual remediation vs. Paridoc.
Questions
How much does manual PDF remediation cost per page?
Usually $5 to $15 a page. Simple text documents sit at the low end; tables, forms and scanned pages at the high end. DocAccess's own sales proposals estimate about $7 a page.
Why does automated remediation cost so much less?
Manual remediation pays a specialist for every page. Automated services convert documents without that labor, so the cost per page drops from dollars to cents.
Is there a one-time fee?
Manual remediation is a one-time fee per document. Automated services are a yearly subscription that covers new and changed documents too.
Updated September 2026
Send us your website's address and we'll count your PDFs and send you a price: paridoc@efile.systems