In years to come future generations will scratch their heads and wonder aloud: Why did it take so long for us to take a quality approach to the care and well-being of people with disabilities seriously?
Despite the many millions of dollars and days Australians have donated and volunteered collectively over the decades, somehow it’s taken us until July this year to introduce a nationwide benchmark.
Read MoreThe NDIS Commission recently released a set of guidelines, called the Approved Quality Auditors Scheme, to regulate the auditing of registered service providers.
An instrument of the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013, the scheme gives a legal framework to the process of assessing providers for compliance against the NDIS Practice Standards.
Read MoreCompetition in the NDIS marketplace for goods and services is generating some fresh realities for providers. A good working knowledge of Federal and State consumer law is now essential.
Sole traders competing to woo participants, carers and plan managers, need to stay within the parameters of laws protecting consumers from unfair trading practices.
Read MoreIt’s a potentially catastrophic mistake to treat the self-assessment elements of NDIS registration as a tick-and-flick bureaucratic chore. The self-assessment questionnaire that forms part of the application process is daunting and requires some homework and preparation, as you would expect from a Quality standard as rigorous as the NDIS has implemented.
Read MoreHuman rights underpin the NDIS legislation and are the foundation on which the shift to the self-directed, person-centred approach is grounded. In the past disability care has had an uneven power base. Now it’s the participant who has the power. Disability support providers need to work with the needs of the participant in this new person-centred and customer-centric ethos of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Read MoreThe future and present employment prospects of thousands of Australians are being transformed by the NDIS, figures show. Disability care is taking the crown that once adorned the mining boom.
Even with the NDIS fully rolled out in only two states (NSW and South Australia), more than 14,271 service providers are now approved to deliver disability supports. This is an increase of 64% since 30 June 2017.
Read MoreThere’s a new dawn for disability care in Australia, but the horizon remains unclear for service providers.
The Quality and Safeguarding Framework (QSF) will eventually yield a nationally consistent set of standards governing the procurement and provision of services funded by the NDIS. But it is still a work in progress, with many of its components under review.
Read MoreRegistration to the NDIS has been available since June 2016 to most service providers, who at that time were regulated by their state or territory.
The National Quality and Safeguarding Framework (QSF) was launched in July 2018 to supersede this localised approach in which the NDIA was registrar for applications.
Read MoreThe first phase of findings from the Independent Pricing Review (IPR) have been adopted in the 2018-19 NDIS Price Guide.
The IPR, delivered by McKinsey & Company in February, looked at the pricing strategy for the NDIS and made 25 recommendations – all of which were accepted in principle by the NDIA.
Read MoreA psychologist, a dietician and a social worker walk into a pub…
Well, no. That joke wouldn’t work, according to the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). Because they are more or less the same thing.
Read MoreThe long-cherished aspiration to have consistent quality in service standards Australia-wide in the disability sector, will soon start to become a reality.
The NDIS is hoping to provide a smooth transition for service-providers when its new Quality and Safeguards Commission (NDIS Commission) rolls out in NSW and SA after July 1.
Read MoreThere are plenty of news stories on people with disability being left out of pocket, anxious and even hospitalised due to the stress of dealing with the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
But the people with a disability are not the only ones suffering - the service-providers endure a bureaucratic nightmare just to get paid, too.
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