Request a Service Animal Access Audit:
Request a Service Animal Access Audit
Refer a business, government program, facility, website, written policy, or recurring access condition for source review, direct outreach, representative interviews, and an organized comparison against official service-animal access authority.
What a Service Animal Access Audit Reviews
The audit examines the public-facing policy, staff response,
representative knowledge, published information, and recurring
access practices connected to the referred organization.
What a Service Animal Access Audit Reviews
The audit examines the public-facing policy, staff response, representative knowledge, published information, and recurring access practices connected to the referred organization.
Published Policies
Website language, signs, customer rules, forms, posted requirements, and written accommodation procedures.
Representative Knowledge
How owners, managers, ADA coordinators, security personnel, public employees, and customer-service representatives explain the applicable access rules.
Permitted Inquiries
Whether staff understand the limited ADA questions and avoid demanding certification, registration, identification, medical records, or task demonstrations.
Behavior and Safety Standards
Whether decisions turn on actual control, housebreaking, conduct, and individualized safety conditions rather than breed, size, appearance, fear, or stereotype.
Digital and Customer Information
Website accessibility, online policies, customer instructions, complaint routes, and whether public information matches actual practice.
Recurring Practice and Service Gaps
Repeated complaints, inconsistent answers, inaccessible procedures, unresolved barriers, and gaps between policy and customer experience.
Audit reach: program and policy reviews may be performed nationwide. Physical access reviews are presently centered in Texas.
Program · Policy · Physical Access
Access Obligations at a Glance
The audit compares the obligations of businesses open to the public
with the actual responsibilities of service-animal handlers.
Access Obligations at a Glance
The audit compares the obligations of businesses open to the public with the actual responsibilities of service-animal handlers.
Businesses Open to the Public
Service Animal Handlers
Generally allow access
Admit service animals to areas where customers are normally permitted, subject only to limited lawful exceptions.
Use a task-trained service dog
The dog must be individually trained to perform work or tasks directly related to the handler’s disability.
Ask the two permitted questions
Ask whether the dog is required because of a disability and what work or task the dog has been trained to perform when those facts are not apparent.
Answer the permitted questions
Explain the disability-related need and trained work or task without being required to disclose a diagnosis.
Demand private documentation
Do not require certification, registration, identification, medical records, a special vest, or a task demonstration.
Have actual trained work or tasks
No private certificate or registry is required, but the dog must genuinely perform trained disability-related work or tasks.
Add pet fees or access surcharges
Do not charge a pet deposit, cleaning fee, or access fee merely because a service animal accompanies the customer.
Remain responsible for actual damage
Ordinary damage rules may apply when the same rules are applied to other customers who cause similar damage.
Use an individualized assessment
Evaluate the specific dog’s actual conduct rather than its breed, size, appearance, or past experiences with unrelated animals.
Keep the dog under control
Use a leash, harness, tether, voice, signal, or another effective method when a physical restraint cannot properly be used.
Remove the dog only on a lawful basis
Removal may be appropriate when the dog is not housebroken or is out of control and the handler does not take effective corrective action.
Maintain housebreaking and conduct
Keep the dog housebroken and take effective action when its behavior becomes disruptive or control is lost.
Continue serving the person
When lawful removal occurs, offer the person an opportunity to receive the goods or services without the animal where that can be done.
Provide care and supervision
The handler remains responsible for feeding, toileting, supervising, and otherwise caring for the service animal.
Independent Outreach and Fact-Finding
ServiceAnimalAlert may contact the referred organization,
interview responsible representatives, ask relevant local
officials how service-animal access rules are understood, and
compare those responses against official authority.
Independent Outreach and Fact-Finding
ServiceAnimalAlert may contact the referred organization, interview responsible representatives, ask relevant local officials how service-animal access rules are understood, and compare those responses against official authority.
Representative Contact
Direct calls or written inquiries may be placed to an owner, manager, ADA coordinator, security office, customer-service department, or other responsible representative.
Local-Official Knowledge Check
When relevant, local public personnel may be asked how service-animal access requirements are understood, communicated, and administered within the jurisdiction.
Policy-versus-Practice Comparison
Written policies, public statements, representative answers, and reported practices are placed beside the controlling federal and state sources.
Response Record
The audit identifies who was contacted, what was represented, which sources apply, what conflicts remain, and which corrective options are available.
Unannounced telephone outreach may be used when a real-time representative response is material to evaluating how the organization communicates and applies its public-access policy.
Return to Audit Intake
Official Standards Used in the Audit
Open the authority directory to review the federal rules and
official guidance used to compare written policies, representative
responses, safety decisions, and public-facing access practices.
Official Standards Used in the Audit
Open the authority directory to review the federal rules and official guidance used to compare written policies, representative responses, safety decisions, and public-facing access practices.
Businesses and Public Accommodations Restaurants, stores, hotels, healthcare offices, entertainment venues, and public-facing organizations Title III
Public-Accommodation Access Standards
The audit compares business policies and representative responses against the ADA standards governing public accommodations and service-animal access.
State and Local Government Programs Municipal offices, courts, police, public schools, shelters, public hospitals, transit, and government services Title II
Public-Entity Programs and Services
Public-program audits use the federal standards governing disability access in state and local government services, programs, and activities.
Questions, Identification, and Documentation Permitted inquiries, task questions, certification, identification, registration, and medical records DOJ FAQ
What Staff May Ask or Require
Representative answers are compared against DOJ guidance on the two limited questions, task training, identification, certification, registration, and documentation demands.
Control, Removal, and Individualized Safety Actual behavior, housebreaking, loss of control, direct threat, safety conditions, and stereotypes ADA
Conduct-Based Access Decisions
The audit reviews whether exclusions are tied to actual behavior and individualized safety information rather than assumptions about breed, size, appearance, or disability.
Website and Digital Access Public forms, online policies, accessible information, complaint routes, and digital service barriers Web ADA
Digital Customer Access
Website reviews consider whether inaccessible digital features or unclear online procedures interfere with goods, services, programs, or benefits.
Official Reporting and Complaint Routes Federal intake, complaint information, government reporting, and agency-controlled enforcement procedures U.S. DOJ
Federal Complaint Information
When audit findings identify a material concern, the final brief may identify the appropriate official complaint or reporting channel for the affected setting.
What the Completed Access Audit Produces
The final product organizes the governing sources, outreach
responses, material access concerns, conflicting practices, and
practical corrective options into one reviewable audit brief.
What the Completed Access Audit Produces
The final product organizes the governing sources, outreach responses, material access concerns, conflicting practices, and practical corrective options into one reviewable audit brief.
Authority Index
Federal, state, local, regulatory, and official agency sources connected to the organization and setting.
Outreach Summary
Parties contacted, questions presented, information received, unanswered inquiries, and material representative statements.
Access Findings
Knowledge gaps, conflicting answers, policy defects, recurring practices, digital barriers, or unresolved conditions.
Corrective Checklist
Education, policy revision, staff clarification, website correction, official reporting, or follow-up options.
Material concern identified? The audit may identify the appropriate official reporting route, contact relevant authorities when circumstances warrant, or provide source-backed information for direct follow-up.
Findings · Sources · Corrective Options
What Happens After I Request an Access Audit?
The request becomes the starting point for independent source
review and direct outreach.
ServiceAnimalAlert returns an organized audit brief identifying
the applicable authority, responses received, access concerns,
and corrective options.
What Happens After I Request an Access Audit?
The request becomes the starting point for independent source review and direct outreach. ServiceAnimalAlert returns an organized audit brief identifying the applicable authority, responses received, access concerns, and corrective options.
Request Screened
The organization, policy, condition, and requested scope are organized.
Sources Gathered
Applicable federal, state, local, regulatory, and agency authorities are identified.
Outreach Conducted
Representatives or relevant public personnel may be contacted for policy and knowledge responses.
Practices Compared
Written rules, answers, reported practices, and official authority are placed side by side.
Findings Returned
Sources, responses, concerns, corrective options, and next routes are condensed.
The completed audit is designed for practical use: one organized record of the reviewed policy, parties contacted, controlling sources, material findings, and corrective options.
Independent Access Audit Brief