From Friday small businesses will face fines of up to £50,000 if they fail to comply with the final phase of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA).

Yet most of the 7,000 small to medium sized businesses across Sussex will ignore the legislation and take their chances.

Firms supplying goods and services will have to make "reasonable adjustments" to their premises and operations to ensure they are disabled friendly.

Changes include widening doors for wheelchairs, introducing ramps and hand-rails and providing disabled-friendly lavatories.

Where physical alterations are too costly or impractical businesses should consider alternative arrangements, such as providing home delivery services.

If a disabled person feels a service is inaccessible he or she will be able to approach the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) to pursue the case through the courts.

The majority of household name companies like Marks & Spencer, American Express and British Airways, already comply with the 1995 Act.

But the picture is very different among smaller businesses.

In July the Federation of Small Businesses found that 42 per cent of its 185,000 members had done nothing to comply with the act.

The Royal National Institure for the Deaf, meanwhile, has estimated that three-quarters of the 26,000 small businesses in Sussex will ignore the new laws altogether.

Previously, businesses employing fewer than 15 people were exempt from the act but this will no longer be the case.

Tony Mernagh, executive director of the Brighton and Hove Economic Partnership, said most SMEs would adopt a wait to be sued policy.

He said: "I walk into shops day after day, look around and think, 'how on earth are they going to comply with the disability discrimination act?'

"How are they going to remove this obstacle or that internal flight of stairs and, I am afraid, the glaringly obvious answer is they won't.

"The DDA is still below the radar for most businesses.

"They are more concerned about a downturn in the economy which is starting to look inevitable.

"They simply cannot cope with all the mounting legislation."

He feared some disabled groups would go out of their way to test the new laws.

He said: "Disabled people have worked very hard to get these laws passed and they are not going to settle for people not taking them seriously.

"They will go after a few of the major companies who haven't complied and then work their way through the smaller chains, ticking them off until people get the message."

One of the weaknesses of the legislation is its vagueness.

Much will hang on the word "reasonable".

If the cost of making an adjustment would force someone out of business it would not be reasonable.

But the legal definition of reasonable will be open to interpretation until a business is taken to court.

Not suprisingly, the disabled lobby will be trying to get a test case as soon as possible.

With more than 200 disabled-access groups monitoring the implementation of the law, businesses would be foolish to think they can ignore it.

Don't say you haven't been warned.