Are you accessing the NDIS for yourself or your loved ones? If you find the NDIS terminology daunting or technical, we have compiled a list of commonly used terms and their explanations to help you understand and make the most of the NDIS. For a comprehensive list of explanations, visit the NDIS Glossary. Here are a few key terms to get you started:
NDIS: The National Disability Insurance Scheme, a new approach to service delivery and funding for people with disabilities that puts them at the centre of the system.
Funded Supports: Supports paid for by the NDIS as part of a participant's plan, based on their reasonable and necessary needs.
Informal Supports: Supports provided by family, friends, and neighbours to a participant.
Registered Provider: A disability support provider that meets the NDIS requirements and standards to deliver services.
Supports: Resources and assistance that help individuals with daily activities, community participation, and achieving their goals.
Acronyms:
- AT: Assistive Technology
- FPDN: First Peoples Disability Network
- ILO: Independent Living Options
- LAC: Local Area Coordinator
- NAT: National Access Team
- NDIA: National Disability Insurance Agency
- NDIS: National Disability Insurance Scheme
- SIL: Supported Independent Living
- SDA: Specialist Disability Accommodation
- STA: Short-Term Accommodation (Respite)
- SLES: School Leaver Employment Supports
Definitions:
Access/Eligibility Requirements: To become an NDIS participant, you must meet specific requirements established by the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA). These requirements include age, residence, disability, and early intervention.
Advocate: An individual or organization that can act or speak on your behalf, with your permission. Advocates can provide independent support to individuals who feel that their needs are not being heard or cannot articulate their wants and needs.
Agency Managed (NDIA Managed): One of the three choices for the financial management of an NDIS plan, with the other two being Plan Managed and Self-Managed. If you choose Agency Managed, the NDIA will pay your support providers and manage your finances and paperwork on your behalf.
Assistive Technology: Any device or system that enables individuals to perform tasks they would otherwise be unable to do or increases the ease and safety with which tasks can be performed.
Carer: A person who provides personal care, support, and help to an individual with a disability and is not contracted as a paid or voluntary worker. Carers are often family members or guardians.
Capacity Building Supports: An NDIS funding category designed for activities that support participants in learning new skills. These skills may include achieving goals such as living independently, finding a job, or getting help with NDIS plan management.
Capital Supports: An NDIS funding category that provides funding for Assistive technology and home or vehicle modifications. The NDIS is very specific about how this funding can be used, and it must be used as it is allocated.
Choice and Control: Participants have the right to make their own decisions about what is important to them, as well as the decision for who provides support and how that support is provided.
Community Engagement: Describes the ways people are involved in the wider community.
Community Services: Activities and interests available to everyone in the community that are not supplied by government groups, such as social, study, and sporting interests.
Complaints: If you are unhappy with any part of the process, system, product, or service provided by the NDIA, you can make a complaint. This can be done in writing or verbally and can be provided by a participant, provider, family member, or carer.
Core Supports: An NDIS funding category that helps participants in their everyday life. This area of an NDIS Plan has four budget categories within it, which can be flexible to accommodate individual needs.
Developmental Delay: When a child develops at a slower rate than other children of the same age and does not reach milestones at the expected times.
Early Childhood Partner: The NDIA.
