What responsibilities do Support Coordinators have to monitor plan spending?

On the 27^th of May the NDIA released a stern letter to Support Coordinators warning they will take action against Support Coordinators who facilitate rapid plan spending and then contact the NDIA requesting more funding. This letter was welcomed by some, while others were indignant that the NDIA saw Support Coordinators in this manner considering all hard work, stress and toil that goes on behind the scenes to support participants. 

What is the role of a Support Coordinator in monitoring a participant’s plan utilisation?

Support Coordinators are funded to support a participant to make decisions. They are one cog in the wheel of a person’s life, but a very important one.

The NDIS Supported Decision Making Policy outlines that there are 4 key roles of a Support Coordinator. One of the roles is to “monitor plan budgets and support effectiveness”. Support Coordinators who were not registered with the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission used to be unable to access the portal to see a participants budget. The NDIA have closed this loophole in the development of PACE which provides the opportunity for live budgets (upon participant consent) to be seen be all Support Coordinators, regardless of registration status.

Support Coordinators also play a key role in the safeguarding of participants. In Attachment A of the NDIS Participant Safeguarding Policy, Support Coordinators are mentioned as having a formal role in identifying participant risk and notifying the NDIA of these risks. A participant not being able to effectively use their NDIS plan (i.e. either overspending or under spending their plan) is a risk factor, and Support Coordinators can help mitigate that risk.

Some participants may require more support than they can receive from a Support Coordinator. In such cases, an app may assist them to visualise and understand their budget, or maybe other capacity building supports could help. The NDIS can fund these supports, if deemed reasonable and necessary for the individual. If needed, the person, perhaps with assistance from their Support Coordinator and allied health reports, should make a case to the NDIA for these supports.

Another argument I often hear is that a participant is exercising their choice and control when overspending their plan budget. It is important to remember that choice and control comes after reasonable and necessary. Reasonable and necessary is used to determine funded supports in a participants plan. However, a participant has choice and control as to who provides these supports, and how and when they will be delivered. A participant may choose to use a lot of their budget in an intensive period of supports. This may be perfectly appropriate in some situations. However, if a participant is utilising their choice and control to spend all their Core supports within 3 months with the expectation that this funding will be topped up, this may put them at imminent risk for the rest of their plan. This is when a Support Coordinator would be responsible to assist in their role as a decision supporter and if required safeguard the participant by alerting the NDIA to the risk of overspend.

Internal Reviews & Change of circumstances

None of this prevents a person from asking for an internal review if they disagree with the funded supports in their plan or negating the fact that a participant’s circumstances have genuinely changed and there is a need for a new plan to be built. For the NDIA to be able to action either of these processes they will need to receive evidence supporting the claim, so just make sure you have dotted your ‘I’s’ and crossed your ‘T’s’ before submitting the paperwork. In the meantime, the NDIA will expect that the plan spend stay within budget.

What can Support Coordinators do?

A few tips for you amazing support coordinators out there

1.         Proactively monitor the budget

You may want to set up a budget forecast meeting at the beginning of your relationship with the participant, to work out how much money they can spend on all their supports and develop a plan. After this has been established you can then check the budget regularly to see if it is staying on track or starting to veer off in another direction.

2.         Understand plan flexibility

Knowing how plan funds can be spent flexibly is another safeguard you can provide participants. If things don’t quite go to plan (and this is real life), then re-doing the budget forecast and knowing where you might be able to tweak things might get a participant through to the end of their plan without requesting a plan reassessment. This can save everyone a lot of time and trouble.

3.         Consider supports to help participants to stick to their budget

There are many ways you can support a participant to stick to their budget. This may include supporting a person to engage a capacity building provider who can work with them to build skills and identify other supports that might help, such as Assistive Technology or memory aids.