ABN 68 985 026 718

Preparing Families and Clients for an NDIS Plan

This project was collated with the assistance of CarersNSW, ARAFMI NSW and service providers. National Respite especially wishes to acknowledge the time and resource put into this project by service providers in the Barwon and Hunter trial sites.

1.1 Steps Services Can Take Before Transition as an Organisation

Step / Resources Available / Resources for Special Groups
  1. Get to know the steps of the NDIS - You will need to do this with all of your office staff and support workers.
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  • National Respite General NDIS Terminology.
  • NDIA Support Clusters and Pricing outline the possible support clusters within the NDIS and their price.
  • National Respite Pricing Dictionary maps current respite outputs to NDIA clusters.
  • National Respite NDIS Supports Glossary is a simple summary of NDIA supports. Two case studies are used to clarify how supports now might look for the same person under the NDIS.
  • NDIA Operational Guidelines will help you to understand what can be funded in a client’s plan. Supports for Sustaining Informal Support (Respite Guideline), Recreation Supports (Recreation Group Programs) and personal care supports are most relevant to respite providers.
  • National Respite has developed one page summaries for Respite in the NDIS, Recreation and Group Activities in the NDIS and Personal Care in the NDIS. These summaries highlight the most important things you need to know around language and what will and won’t be funded in a plan. You will need to communicate these to your families and clients.
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  • One page summary of Psychosocial Disability Guideline in development.
  • MHA Fact Sheets on NDIS and psychosocial disability are available here.

  1. Check that your organisational policy and documentation is NDIS ready
  • Does your service’s policy documentation reflect NDIS language, individualised funding landscape and put the goals and aspirations of the participant first?
  • Does your referral form capture information about potential NDIS participants
  • Do you have an NDIS service agreement?
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  • Sample client referral form (Captures NDIS Information) is availablehere.
  • NDIS Booklet for clients and service providers with a sample service agreement is located here.
  • Sample Service Agreement from trial site can be found here.

1.2 Steps Services Can Take with Individual Clients and Families Before Transition

Step / Resources Available / Resources for Special Groups
  • Let people know about workshops and sessionsthat use the language of the NDIA - If you have a bulletin, you should regularly feature NDIS related resources.
/ National Resources:
  • Pathways to Leadership run nation-wide inclusion and person centred workshops for people with disability and their chosen support networks.
State Resources:
NSW:
  • Resourcing Families help families to think about visions, goals and aspirations for their loved one as well as harnessing informal support networks.
  • My Choice Matters is all about understanding person centred support. They have regular NSW events for people with a disability and their chosen carers.
  • There are also a number of capacity building programs under the ADHC Getting Prepared initiative.
ACT:
  • ADACAS Advocacy runSupport My Decisions for people with disability to learn about how they can make decisions about their supports.

  • Create a new role within the organization for an NDIS Liaison Officer or similar - who can assist families to prepare and understand supports.
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  • Case Study in development

  • Arrange phone or face to face meetings with clients and families to:
  • Articulate the supports they have now in a weekly plan
  • Look at what the language looks like under the NDIS to describe those supports
  • Ask them what else would help support the person with a disability to have a full life. What are the person’s goals and aspirations?
  • Allow up to three hours per client. This sounds like a lot, but not if you start early and use your new NDIS Family Liaison officer or equivalent.
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  • The Agency has a checklist and booklet to help families and participants prepare for a plan and participant statement.
The adult one is here.
The children’s one is here.
  • Organisations have made their own to work through with clients.
Cerebral Palsy Alliance have designed a booklet to work through with possible NDIS clients. Your organisation can design a similar one to work through with families.
A second, simpler NDIS trial site planning support booklet can be found here.
  • After this meeting, you might like to give out the easy language version of the NDIS planning process. You can find it here.
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  • There are CALD versions explaining the planning process in:
  • Arabic
  • Cantonese
  • Greek
  • Italian
  • Mandarin
  • Spanish
  • Vietnamese
on the Agency website along with the English booklet.
  • Run workshops that explain the general principles of the NDIS to families and clients - You could do this with other services.
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  • NDIS Plan Template can be used to construct a plan within the workshop.