About the NDIS & Home Care Packages (HCP) Programs

Understand how your business can help National Disability Insurance Scheme participants and Home Care Packages recipients.

What is the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS)?

The NDIS allows more than 500,000 Australians who have a permanent and significant disability access to to gain more time with family and friends, greater independence, access to new skills, jobs, or volunteering in their community, and an improved quality of life. The support that they receive can be used for supports and services such as a pre-prepared and delivered meal service. 

What are Home Care Packages (HCP)?

Home Care Packages is a Government funded program that can help Senior Australians (over 65) remain at home for longer, as well as providing choice and flexibility in the way care and support is provided. There are currently over 150,000 HCPs in Australia which is set to grow significantly in the years to come.

The premise of the program is to meet to the needs and preferences of older Australians by placing them at the centre of aged care services. As Australians live longer and healthier lives,  it's important we have choice about our care as we age. Reviews into aged care have found that older Australians do not want to be passive recipients of services. Rather they want the opportunity to play an active role in where they live, which provider they choose to deliver their care and the ways in which services are provided. Feedback has also consistently shown that older Australians wish to remain living independently in their own homes for as long as possible.

In response, the Australian Government has progressively implemented a number of reforms to the aged care sector in order to deliver a consumer directed care (CDC) approach to aged care services. One of these is the Home Care Packages program, and providing meals is part of this program.

What role does food & nutrition play in these programs?

The importance of providing both choice and nutritious food for both NDIS & HCP participants is part of what the programs are designed to enable.

How do the packages work for meals?

Essentially participants are able to either:

• Pay for their meals upfront and then get reimbursed via their Plan Manager
• Pay for only 30% of their meals upfront, with the supplier recovering the balance directly through their Plan Manager

The reason for the 30% portion is the Government only reimburses the preparation and delivery costs, not ingredient costs. This split is standard across food businesses.

Why do participants love only paying the 30% upfront?

Participants are telling us they love this option as it means they are only out of pocket for a much smaller amount and don’t need to do all of the administration that they would otherwise in order to claim it back.

Who is eligible for only paying 30% upfront?

All HCP participants are able to access this function, whilst only NDIS participants on Plan-Managed accounts can access this. If NDIS participants are on Self-Managed accounts, they are required to submit a copy of the approved tax invoice and claim back via the Government’s portal.

How can a food business use these programs to grow their businesses?

These programs provide you with a great avenue to grow your businesses. As the participant is only out-of-pocket for 30% of the meal cost, they are not as price sensitive as they would otherwise be and many of these participants have also reluctantly been accessing mass produced and poor-quality food. The overwhelming feedback we have received is they love receiving fresh, nutritious meals, cooked by someone in their community that they can relate to.

How does Cookaborough make it easy for food businesses?

There are a few ways that Cookaborough makes it very easy for food businesses to service these segments. To read more about this our blog on Servicing HCP and NDIS delves into this. But two very useful features Cookaborough has built are:

Invoicing: In order to claim meals, the participants are required to provide an approved tax invoice that splits the cost of the ingredients and meal preparation. Cookaborough automatically issues an invoice to Providers or HCP and NDIS Plan Managers for the balance, whereupon invoices are generally paid within 3-5 business days. 

Customer tracking: Customers on these programs are identified separately to other customers, allowing you to take extra care when servicing them, and to easily track this segment of your business.

Am I a ‘Registered Provider’ and can I use the NDIS logo?

It is important to note that Cookaborough is not a Registered NDIS Provider, and most of the businesses using the platform are not either, rather we are fully compliant to NDIS standards for Self-Managed and Plan-Managed participants to utilise the services of the food business.

Unless you have completed the NDIS Provider registration process, you should not make claim to being an NDIS Registered Provider. To find out more about becoming an NDIS Provider visit this website. However, to promote your support and compliance you are able to use the ‘I/we heart NDIS’ logo. These logos can be accessed via this link.

The opportunity for your food business.

The HCP and NDIS programs are growing significantly, and meals are playing a key role within this. For example there are currently over 300,000 participants in the HCP, and this is growing at least 10% each year.

Due to the nature of the relationship and the funding they receive, these customers are more likely to order multiple meals and repeatedly place orders each week. As they are also only outlying 30% of the actual cost of the meals, they are generally not as price sensitive as others.

For many food businesses using the Cookaborough platform, the HCP and NDIS programs represent the most significant part of their business. The feedback we receive from them is that this significance is not simply because of the additional revenue, but for the reward of connecting to this sector of the community and helping to improve the quality of life for people in their community.