New guidelines released to make NDIS planning clearer

The NDIA has released new operational guidelines and a statement of the underlying principles used to develop participant plans, as part of a number of significant improvements being made to the NDIS.

NDIA CEO, Martin Hoffman said the guidelines will give NDIS participants clearer information about creating and using NDIS plans, to ensure they can make best use of their NDIS funding.

“We’ve heard from participants that the NDIS can be complex and unclear so we are committed to making the Scheme simpler and easier to use, ensuring that people can more easily access the supports they need,” Mr Hoffman said.

“Today we have released three new operational guidelines, as well as the principles we follow to create NDIS plans and how we make decisions about which supports we can fund.

“This is supported by an information catalogue ‘Would we fund it?’, outlining when the NDIA might fund or not fund a particular support, with clear examples and case studies, to help people use their plans more effectively.”

The operational guidelines released today include:

  • Creating your Plan – explaining what participants can expect from the NDIA when their plan is created, what happens during their planning conversation and how they can prepare.
  • Reasonable and Necessary – providing detail about how the NDIA makes decisions about funding for reasonable and necessary supports.
  • Your Plan – outlining what happens when a participant’s plan is approved and how participants can start using their plan.

Mr Hoffman said clearer guidelines are part of more than 50 individual improvements being made to the NDIS through the Service Improvement Plan released in August last year.

“Through the improvement plan we have committed to using consistent terms and definitions with less jargon and being clearer on what reasonable and necessary supports means, with case studies and examples,” Mr Hoffman said.

“The new format guidelines do not make any changes to the planning process. Instead, they explain our existing processes in more detail.

Mr Hoffman said what the NDIA considers to be reasonable and necessary supports has not changed, however the new guideline and published principles makes it clearer how the NDIA makes decisions on funding.

“Transparency is important to us. It is one of the key principles in our Service Charter. That’s why we have made these new resources available – so participants can see the guidance our planners use when they make decisions that impact them.”