Support Coordination Services
Help participants understand their NDIS plan
Support coordinators help participants understand their NDIS plan, including:
- Support budgets and how flexible each support category is and what kinds of things the participant can use their funding for
- How the participant’s NDIS funding may be managed
- What other requirements need to be met to access these supports such as when quotes might be required, what can or cannot be claimed, how much can be claimed, and when service bookings required.
Participants choose who to share their plan with. A participant and their support coordinator should talk about what information the support coordinator needs to best meet the participant’s needs.
Support coordinators must provide information using the participant’s preferred language and method of communication.
Connect participants with supports and services
A support coordinator should have knowledge of services available to participants. Support coordinators should help the participant:
- Identify and discuss the range of available NDIS, informal, community and mainstream supports (including other government and community services)
- Explore how they can exercise choice and control when choosing providers
- Connect with NDIS providers and other supports and services they require.
To help a participant find a range of service providers who can meet their individual needs, a support coordinator should talk to the participant about:
- When a participant must choose registered NDIS providers – for example for NDIA-managed supports or for certain classes of supports as identified by the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission
- When a participant can choose unregistered NDIS providers – for example when a participant is self-managing or using a plan manager
- Quality and safeguards arrangements – including ensuring their provider is not the recipient of a Banning Order from the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission
- Any special assessments or processes that need to be followed – for example, where a participant is exploring housing options, home or vehicle modifications, or high cost assistive technology.
Support coordinators should also consider the role of informal, community and mainstream supports available to a participant.
Where other government services are required, a support coordinator should work with the participant to access these supports and services.
Design support approaches
Support coordinators should help a participant design the right mix of supports and services to help them pursue their goals. This should include NDIS-funded, informal, community and mainstream supports.
A participant’s supports should be tailored to their circumstances, needs and preferences in line with the funding available in their plan.
Support coordinators should help the participant:
- Identify their support preferences based on their goals
- Design a schedule of services which is in line with expected plan spend, and will help participants to pursue their goals and meet their needs
- Identify providers who can meet the participant’s needs
- Explore and trial different support options
- Evaluate the effectiveness of different support options in meeting the participant’s needs and helping the participant to pursue their goals
- Navigate and work with multiple providers.
Establish supports
To establish a participant’s supports, a support coordinator should help a participant:
- Create service agreements and service bookings that reflect their support needs and preferences, including helping the participant to negotiate level and price of supports and services
- Understand the NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits, including travel and cancellation policies
- Identify any potential barriers and risks to plan implementation and identify strategies to overcome these.
To maintain a participant’s supports, a support coordinator should also work with participants to:
- Regularly check to make sure their supports are still meeting their needs
- Develop a plan for addressing unexpected interruptions to supports, including how to manage:
- Provider cancellation or withdrawal of services
- Situations where a participant is not satisfied with their supports or service provider.
- Find new providers or change providers where needed, including helping to facilitate a smooth handover to the incoming provider to ensure the participant continues to get the support they need.
Support coordinators should make participants aware they can make a complaint about the quality or safety of NDIS supports and services to the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission
Coach, refine and reflect
A support coordinator should coach the participant to become more confident and independent when:
- Navigating NDIS systems and processes
- Establishing their supports, including negotiating with providers
- Choosing and controlling how to make the best use of their supports in plan.
When implementing supports in a participant’s plan, a support coordinator should help the participant:
- Evaluate how effectively the supports have met, and continue to meet, the participant’s needs
- Track progress towards pursuing the participant’s goals, including how their current supports contribute
- Adjust the mix of supports or how they are delivered according to the participant’s needs and wishes.
When preparing evidence to support an upcoming plan reassessment, a support coordinator should also reflect with the participant on:
- What worked well, including what outcomes were achieved
- What the participant would like to explore, change and/or improve in their next plan, including what evidence might be needed.
Reporting to the NDIA
Support coordinators and participants should regularly talk about how a participant is going with using their plan to pursue their goals.
These conversations should be documented in the following reports:
- Initial plan implementation report completed 8 weeks after a participant’s plan begins or after the support coordinator accepts the request for service. Support coordinators should review and outline:
- What the participant and support coordinator have agreed to work on during the participant’s plan
- Steps taken by the support coordinator within the first few weeks to help the participant to use their plan.
- Mid-term implementation report should be completed on a regular basis. How often these reports must be completed will be outlined in the request for service. Support coordinators should:
- Detail what they done so far to support the participant with plan implementation
- Provide a general progress update on how the participant is going with using their plan and pursuing their goals – including any emerging risks or participant concerns
- Outline what the support coordinator will do in the future – including any actions or strategies to address risks or concerns.
- Plan reassessment and evaluation report should be completed before the participant’s next plan reassessment. The participant and their support coordinator should reflect on how the participant’s plan has been implemented, including:
- How the participant used their supports in plan to pursue their goals, progress towards their goals, and the outcomes achieved in line with the NDIS Participant Outcomes Framework
- What actions were taken to ensure that the plan is implemented
- Any barriers or challenges which may have impacted on the plan implementation – including what the impact was and how the support coordinator worked with the participant to address and overcome these
- Any recommendations about what the participant might need for their next plan.
Support coordinators must provide these reports to the NDIA. Reporting requirements will be outlined in the request for service.
It will include details about what information and when these reports should be provided to the NDIA.
Support coordinators can claim report writing time for an NDIA-requested report if all the conditions in the NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits are met.
Funding for support coordination in a participant’s plan will consider report writing time.
Support coordinators play an important part in promoting and protecting the safety of participants.
All NDIS providers, including support coordinators, must promptly take steps to raise and act on concerns about matters that may impact the quality and safety of supports and services provided to people with disability.
Build capacity and resilience
Support coordinators should work with participants, their families and carers to build their confidence and skills to implement their plan more independently. To do this, a support coordinator should:
- Explore how the participant can exercise choice and control
- Help the participant to clarify their support preferences
- Help the participant to identify suitable providers who can meet their needs
- Identify and create opportunities for the participant to do these activities more independently.
These tasks should be led by the participant and their families and carers.
A support coordinator should not make decisions on a participant’s behalf. Instead they should support participants to make their own decisions, allowing participants to take reasonable risks.
Preparing for unexpected situations
Support coordinators should help participants, their families and carers prepare for unexpected events or challenging situations.
To do this, a support coordinator should:
- Understand the participant’s circumstances and environment, including any potential and emerging risks
- Identify what events or changes in circumstances could occur, this could include:
- Changes in family circumstances and their ability to provide support
- Moving house
- Hospitalisation
- Change in living circumstances
- Service provider changes
- Identify any other barriers which could affect the participant’s access to, or ability to use, their supports
- Plan for unexpected events or situations that might arise
- Put the plan into action should the event or situation occur.
When doing this, a support coordinator should make sure they are including participants so they can do these tasks more independently in the future.
Crisis: planning, prevention, mitigation and action
A support coordinator should work with participants, their families and carers to:
- List key contacts and/or supports
- Establish supports to prevent crisis situations from arising
- Ensure a crisis plan is in place
- Help the participant to put the crisis plan into action should a crisis occur
- Where appropriate, link the participant to other government services such as justice, education, child and family protection.
Support coordinators should assist participants to access crisis services if needed.
Support coordinators may also need to help participants submit a request for a plan reassessment.
Specialist support coordination activities
Address complex barriers
Specialist support coordinators should help overcome complex barriers that affect participants’ ability to access and maintain appropriate supports. They should work with participants, their families and carers to:
- Identify and understand the barriers impacting the participant’s ability to access, use and maintain their supports
- Find and try solutions to address these barriers
- Establish a process to overcome these barriers, including prioritising factors that need to be addressed first and what supports need to be in place immediately.
Design a service plan for complex support needs, where appropriate
Sometimes a participant may need a service plan to address significant complexities in their life.
Specialist support coordinators should work with the participant, their families and carers to identify a broad network of a supports – funded or other supports – that can help the participant use their plan.
Specialist support coordinators should design a service plan which:
- Ensures all services can work effectively and cohesively together to help a participant to pursue their goals
- Establishes processes to enable communication, cooperation and collaboration within the participant’s network of funded and non-funded supports
- Helps the participant, their family and carers to resolve issues and unexpected situations
- Ensures a consistent delivery of service and access to relevant supports in a crisis or unplanned event.
Once a service plan is designed, a participant’s support coordinator can help the participant and their support network put the service plan into action.
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