Aged Care and NDIS Registration

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NDIS Registration and Readiness

A report from the Australia Institute of Health and Welfare (2019) indicates there are approximately 6,000 young people (under the age of 65) living in residential aged care.

In 2019, the Government announced an action plan to support younger people living in aged care to access more appropriate housing and supported living options. The action plan includes to halve the number of young people entering aged care by 2025.

Aged care providers who provide services and support under an NDIS plan for a younger person are required to register under the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission and if they deliver behaviour supports or use restrictive practices. Under an NDIS plan, the provider is receiving funds from the NDIS for services and supports. Registration is to ensure obligations are met for quality and safety of care and services and that they are equitable to the specific care and health support needs of an NDIS participant. 

Not all aged care providers need to register under the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission. There are examples where aged care providers have chosen to diversify their service model for home care delivery and expand to delivery to NDIS participants and are registered. Therefore, the following information may be of interest to any aged care provider. 

If you are an aged care provider delivering services to an NDIS participant, you would have received advice on 18 June 2020 from the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commissioner of an exemption for registration. This exemption expires on 1 December 2020. 

Under registration with the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, aged care providers will be subject to additional responsibilities. Aged care providers who are currently providing care to NDIS participants are already subject to the NDIS Code of Conduct and NDIS participants have access to the NDIS Commission’s complaints processes. 

Responsibilities include: 

• compliance with the NDIS Practice Standards as demonstrated through a quality audit
• comply with the NDIS Code of Conduct and support staff to meet the requirements
• process for complaints management and a resolution system including supporting NDIS participants to make a complaint
• process for incident management and notification to the NDIS Commission for reportable incidents as set out in the rules
• process to undertake worker screening requirements for all workers in roles with contact with people with disability
• meet the behaviour support requirements as outlined in the rules including the reporting of restrictive practices to the NDIS Commission
• all workers involved in delivery of services and supports to undertake the worker orientation e-module ‘Quality, Safety and You’.

Although there are compliance considerations when operating under a dual regulatory environment, they may not be as complex as anticipated. For example, as an approved provider of aged care, suitability assessment by the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission takes the approved provider status into consideration. 

NDIS registration is at the provider level and not at the service level. This means that the compliance and auditing component for registration is proportionate to the size, scope and service delivery of the provider. The audit process is of the organisation and audit methodology includes the locations involved with NDIS services and supports and NDIS participants. The audit is against the NDIS Practice Standards that are relevant to the services and supports that are delivered. As the approved auditing organisations are independent to the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, the provider will choose their preferred approved auditing organisation. 

Need support for NDIS Registration?

Anchor Excellence is initiating a support program for residential aged care providers in their transition to meet the requirements of the NDIS Act 2013 and the NDIS (Provider Registration and Practice Standard) Rules 2018. As part of our AnchorAssure program, we can assess your organisation’s preparedness to be registered under the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission and compliance obligations. AnchorAssure provides a comprehensive assessment of your organisation’s systems and processes to ensure they are in line with the required obligations under the NDIS Rules. You will be provided with a comprehensive report of compliance issues and opportunities for improvement.

Our Compliance and Governance Framework may also be applied to assess the capability of the organisation and systems to respond to the NDIS regulatory environment. This will measure where systems and processes can be designed to meet both regulatory environments and reduce the complexity of reporting and compliance. 

Our Anchor Excellence team is available to assist your organisation in engaging with the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission to navigate the registration process. This may include working with your organisation and NDIS participants.

If you would like more information about registering for NDIS in aged care please contact us via info@anchorexcellence.com or (02) 8610 1950.

Article written by:

Ingrid Fairlie
Aged Services, Disability and Compliance
Remediation Specialist

Britt O’Keefe
Disability Specialist

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