Why do I need this document?
By conducting annual audits of your NDIS Participant’s Service Agreements you will be able to:
- demonstrate what percentage of your NDIS participants have signed and received a copy of their Service Agreement
- determine if your NDIS Participants are completing the consent section of the Service Agreement correctly and you are able to retrieve the information efficiently.
If you are a sole trader or small practice (2-3 allied health professionals (AHPs)), we suggest you audit 10 current Service Agreements. If you have a larger business, say 6 AHPs, we suggest you do 30. If you are a larger organisation we suggest you audit 10% of your current Service Agreements.
Make sure you audit files from across your team to identify if a particular practitioner gets better results than another.
Audits can be time consuming to complete and depending on when your third-party audit is, you may or may not have time to complete this before your audit date. If you don’t have time, don’t panic. You could:
- Put it in your Quality Management Plan and advise the auditors you intend to undertake an NDIS Support Plan Audit to determine compliance across your team in terms of collecting information.
- Do a small sample audit (e.g. 6 files) which you can improve on next time around. This will show the auditors you have tested the process of conducting an NDIS Support Plan Audit and have considered the information it will provide you.
Don’t worry if your audit reveals poor compliance in some areas. The main thing is to demonstrate you have addressed the issues and put in place processes for improvement. But it will be important to show improvement in in the results of your next audit, otherwise it indicates that your management strategies didn’t work. Whatever you do, don’t fudge the results.
A NDIS Participant Service Agreement Audit Form is provided for you to collect information on.
This form is designed to be used in conjunction with the Quality Improvement Activity Report (QIAR) form (see Quality Management Section). Complete the initial part of the QIAR and then collect your data. Once you have completed the audit, summarise the results and complete the rest of the QIAR, including any actions required.
Once you have completed the audit you will need to spend some time analysing your results. Here are some things to consider:
- Has the Service Agreement been signed by the appropriate person?
- Was the participant provided with a copy of their Service Agreement?
- Is the consent section filled out and are the agreed consents easy to find on the participant’s file?
- Are some team members better than others at obtaining and documenting consent in the participant’s records?
- How will you improve any unsatisfactory results?
Why the auditors like it
They can see you:
- are providing choice to participants regarding their consents
- have put in place strategies to improve your services
- are doing what you say you are doing.
Next Steps
- OPEN the NDIS Participant Service Agreement Audit Form
- PLAN an audit date and insert it on your Quality Improvement Plan
- COMPLETE the initial part of the Quality Improvement Activity Report (QIAR) form. Enter the audit in the Quality Improvement Projects Register (see Quality Management section for these documents)
- CONDUCT the NDIS Service Agreement Audit
- DOCUMENT and CONSIDER the results
- CELEBRATE good results and/or BRAINSTORM with your team on how to improve
- DETERMINE a plan to improve performance
- FOLLOW UP on your plan. FINALISE the QIAR and DOCUMENT its completion on the Register
- SET date for next NDIS Participant Service Agreement Audit and insert it on your Quality Management Plan
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