Associated Providers Under the Aged Care Act 2024
Wednesday, 10 December 2025
Presented by:
chair:
Robert Day
First Assistant Secretary, Quality Assurance Division, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing
Speakers:
Simon Christopher
Director, Regulatory Strategy, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing
Sarah Kelly
Registrar, Assistant Commissioner Registrar, Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission
Kristian Wynn
Director, Regulatory Strategy, Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission
[Opening visual of slide with text saying ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘Associated providers under the Aged Care Act 2024’]
[The visuals during this webinar are of each speaker presenting in turn via video, with reference to the content of a PowerPoint presentation being played on screen]
Robert Day:
Good afternoon and welcome to today’s webinar where we’ll be exploring the concept of associated providers and seeking to answer your questions. My name’s Rob Day. I’m the First Assistant Secretary for Quality and Assurance at the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing and it’s a pleasure to be with you today.
As we begin let’s acknowledge that wherever we are around the country we are meeting on traditional country of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and pay respects to their Elders past, present and emerging. And I extend that acknowledgment and respect to any Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who are joining us on the call today.
A couple of quick housekeeping things before we get started. There has been a lot of interest in this topic and so we are going to try and keep the focus of our conversation and our Q&A session today on associated providers. We’ve received several pre-submitted questions. We’ve collated those into a couple of key themes and we’ll answer those in the middle of the session and then we’ll go into live Q&A with your feedback from today. If you’ve got questions outside of the associated provider topic we’d encourage you to contact the Department through other channels as we’re not going to be able to go to all the other topics that may be of interest, and we know there’s a lot happening in aged care, today.
In terms of submitting questions you can use the Q&A function. So you click on the Q&A icon at the top of your screen to activate and you can submit your questions there. You’ve also got the functionality to upvote a question that another participant has posted and that will help guide me in terms of which questions to direct to the panellists when we get to that part of the session.
And I guess just a quick warning. There’s a difference between liking and upvoting. The liking won’t change where it appears on the screen but the upvoting will push it up for me to use. The session today is being recorded and we’ll publish that on our website in the coming days along with the slides that we’re showing you. And finally just to note that because it’s a webinar there is no option for you to turn on your video or your microphone.
Today’s webinar and the topic is about providing some additional information on associated providers and that responds to some direct feedback we had around the 1st of November that providers wanted to know a little bit more about what this concept means, both registered providers and associated providers.
So today we’re going to talk you through how an associated provider is defined under the Act and discuss some examples and some frequently asked questions. And I’m joined by some expert colleagues to help us through that conversation. I am joined by my colleague Simon Christopher from the Department who’s Director in the Harmonisation and Regulatory Strategy Branch, and also a couple of colleagues from the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission, so Sarah Kelly who’s the Registrar in the Regulatory Operations Division and Kristian Wynn who’s a Director in the Regulatory Strategy Section. And together we’ll do the best that we possibly can to answer your questions and how they fit into the aged care ecosystem.
With that let’s jump right on in and I’ll hand over to Simon to get the conversation started.
Simon Christopher:
Great. Thanks very much Rob. Hello everyone and welcome to today’s webinar. As Rob mentioned I’m Simon Christopher and I’d like to start by covering where associated providers fit within the aged care system. To do this I think it’s helpful to understand how the players within the aged care system are defined. And setting that scene it’s worthwhile remembering that the concepts we are discussing today aren’t new. They existed under the previous Aged Care Act. The new Act provides a frame and creates greater transparency around those arrangements including the reporting of subcontracting relationships or as they’re known now associated providers where required by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. I’ll now move on to set out some of those fundamentals.
The entity that directly receives the funding from the Commonwealth to deliver funded aged care services must be registered with the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. This entity is then known as a registered provider. The registered provider remains accountable for the quality and safety of aged care services being delivered. Registered providers are also responsible for ensuring relevant workforce screening and record keeping requirements are met for aged care workers who are delivering funded aged care services on their behalf. This requirement applies to workers that deliver services through associated providers engaged through labour hire companies and includes volunteers. If the registered provider engages another entity or business to deliver some aged care services on their behalf this entity will be known as an associated provider. Associated providers can be registered in their own right but it’s not a requirement that they are registered to deliver services under the Act.
An aged care worker is an individual employed or otherwise engaged by a registered provider or an associated provider to deliver funded aged care services. An individual who is a registered provider directly delivering services is also considered to be an aged care worker under the Act. As mentioned volunteers are considered aged care workers under the new arrangements.
To understand who might be considered an associated provider it’s also helpful to understand what a funded aged care service is. The aged care service list can be found in the Aged Care Rules. It outlines the service types that sit within each registration category and provides details of those services within each service type. Subcontractors of registered providers are only considered to be associated providers if they deliver Government funded aged care services from this list. It’s an important distinction. For example an organisation providing gardening services to older people which are funded by the Support at Home Program such as mowing lawns, pruning shrubs on behalf of a registered provider would be considered an associated provider. These tasks are included in the service list for home support services and are in effect aged care services.
And the lights go out. However gardening is not listed as a service type under residential aged care. So your gardener in that scenario wouldn’t be considered an associated provider.
Moving onto the next slide. To demonstrate this further we’ve developed a visual representation of the relationships that exist between registered providers, associated providers and aged care workers. As noted previously these concepts or some of these concepts existed under the 1997 Act which have been given new labels. For instance subcontractors under the previous Act are now known as associated providers. Starting from the registered provider you can see the arrow shows registered providers can subcontract delivery of funded aged care services to an associated provider however the obligations that pertain to the subcontracted service and compliance responsibility remains with that registered provider.
An associated provider can employ workers. Although employed by the associated provider they need to ensure they comply with relevant workforce requirements such as screening. In effect the registered provider needs to have the same level of satisfaction of compliance for these workers similar to their own directly employed workforce when delivering funded aged care services on behalf of the registered provider.
An aged care worker can be directly employed by an associated provider or a registered provider as I’ve just said. So just to reiterate the point, while an aged care worker may be employed by an associated provider legally it is the registered provider’s responsibility to ensure that the worker complies with the relevant requirements. These worker requirements as mentioned earlier also apply to volunteers.
So we’ve received several questions about when a subcontractor might be considered an associated provider and whether individuals delivering services are associated providers or aged care workers. So I thought it’s probably best for us to look at a couple of examples on how that might work in practice. So we’ll begin with scenario one. This describes an entity registered with the Commission as a provider delivering Support at Home whose service mix includes allied health service type. Here they are a registered provider. They also provide speech pathology services on behalf of another registered provider in a residential care home. Here they’re also an associated provider as they are not in direct receipt of payment for these services delivered. So in effect they are both a registered provider and an associated provider based on the different services they’re delivering.
In scenario two we have a nurse who is an independent contractor. The nurse is engaged by a registered provider to deliver nursing services under the Support at Home Program. Here the nurse would be considered an aged care worker as they are delivering it for the registered provider as an individual.
Scenario three shows a dietician operating as a sole trader. They are subcontracted by a registered provider to deliver dietetic services to Support at Home participants. Because the dietician is a sole trader directly delivering services to older people they again are considered an aged care worker. Even though they are providing services on behalf of the registered provider they meet the definition of an aged care worker because they are engaged by the registered provider as an individual to deliver funded aged care services.
Scenario four takes the same example but here the registered provider uses an organisation to deliver the same dietetic services to Support at Home participants on their behalf. As the company employs multiple allied health practitioners the organisation is considered an associated provider. The allied health practitioners engaged by the organisation are considered aged care workers of the associated provider.
We also understand there’s some confusion around subcontracting arrangements for sole traders. So to try and put it simply if the sole trader as the business owner has no employees and is directly delivering aged care services on behalf of the registered provider they are considered an aged care worker. If however, as our example illustrates, as the business owner the sole trader employs workers to deliver those aged care services and does not deliver them directly themselves, they’re considered an associated provider.
Before I hand over to my colleagues at the Commission I’d like to draw your attention to the resources available on the Department’s website. You can either scan the QR code that’s on the screen or enter the URL into your browser to view them. A key resource I’d like to bring to your attention is the aged care provider requirements search tool. This tool is purposefully designed as an interactive tool for both providers, registered providers, associated providers and aged care workers which allows you based on the registration categories that you deliver under to understand your legislative requirements both from the Act and associated Rules. It will also allow you to export those requirements for later reference specific to your requirements and your service offering.
Thank you for your time. With that I’ll hand over to Sarah Kelly.
Sarah Kelly:
[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission’]
Lovely. Thank you Simon and thanks Rob. It’s really lovely to be here with you today. As Rob mentioned I’m the Registrar at the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission and I am responsible for all things provider registration. Now I’ve got a few slides to share with you before we move onto questions. So I’m just to going to briefly cover our role as a regulator, associated provider reporting and notification requirements, and finish by talking about accountability and how registered providers are responsible for the quality of care that their associated providers deliver.
So let me just first acknowledge that associated provider as a term has been introduced by the Aged Care Act. And I know Simon’s just spoken about the fact that it encompasses concepts that were covered in the previous Act. But the Commission does know that there has been a lot of questions from providers about who’s covered by the definition and what obligations apply.
So first of all I just want to talk briefly about the Commission’s role in regulation. So put simply we ensure the quality, safety and safety of care for older people. So this means that we have a regulatory relationship with associated providers that’s primarily through their relationship with registered providers that they’re delivering services on behalf of. And we do this through things like reporting, information and guidance, oversight and monitoring, registration and conditions and enforcement.
So let’s move on now to reporting. As a registered provider you’re required to report information to us about your associated providers at different points in time. We want you to report information on associated providers as this helps improve transparency and accountability. So it does this by providing us at the Commission with better visibility of changes to your relationships with third party organisations that can effect the delivery, quality or safety of the care that you’re responsible for, and also promotes the responsibility of registered providers to have systems in place to ensure associated providers deliver safe, quality services and comply with requirements such as the Aged Care Code of Conduct.
The main times when you’ll need to report information about your associated providers to us are at the time of registration – and I suspect almost all of you that are here with us today are already registered providers, so at the time of renewal – and also within 14 days of any time you change your arrangements with your associated providers but only if you are delivering services in relation to Categories 4, 5 and 6.
So at the time of your initial registration and at the time of your renewal of registration you’ll need to explain the type and extent of your relationships with any associated providers when you tell us about your legal and business structure. The type of information you must tell us includes the associated provider name and ABN, the associated provider business address, their contact information, and you must make sure it includes details of one or more key contacts that we can communicate with directly if needed.
So if you’re registered providers in Cats 4, 5 and/or 6 you must notify of changes to your arrangements with associated providers delivering services in those categories. So in this instance you would notify us using a change in circumstances form. And depending on the change in your arrangements you’ll need to let us know when there’s the start of a new arrangement, when there’s a variation or an extension of an arrangement, and when there is an end to an arrangement. And I know that there’s been quite a few questions around this and I suspect we’ll unpack that a bit more when we deal with questions.
So when notifying the Commission you’ll need to include information on the associated provider’s business name, their ABN, their Australian company number if any, and their business address. And if arrangements are for providing residential care services you’ll need to tell us the residential care home’s name and address. You’ll also need to tell us the details of the services that the associated provider will deliver under the arrangement including reasons for new, ending or changed arrangements and time periods.
There are also some providers who weren’t previously on GPMS and so their previous records have not been moved over under the new Act. So those providers have up until the 1st of May next year to also update their associated provider relationships as well. The other thing worth mentioning is that Service Agreements between registered providers and older people receiving funded services must list the services that will be delivered by an associated provider. And this applies to any registered providers delivering services to an older person through Support at Home or the Commonwealth Home Support Program. When an associated provider delivers services through Support at Home the older person’s monthly statement must also include the name of the associated provider.
So as you’re probably aware our reporting process currently requires a provider to go to the Commission’s website and download a smart form which is structured in two parts. So part one is a base form which is the main Change in Circumstances Notification to the Commission form and includes several details of identifying information. The second part is completion of the relevant sub-form depending on the type of change that you’re notifying us of, and associated providers is one of those.
So you can see in this second image here where I’ve highlighted to you the three sub-forms that would be relevant to you with regards to associated provider changes, and these are called Add Associated Provider form, Remove Associated Provider form or Change an Associated Provider Relationship form. So when you’re filling out these forms it’s important to correctly input the name and ID of your registered provider in the main Change in Circumstances Notification form. And we recommend that you copy and paste this from the GPMS Manage Your Organisation page to avoid the submission failing when you submit it. You can then upload the base form – in this instance it would be the Change in Circumstances Notification form – and one form for each change notification using the Commission’s uploader.
Sorry. And if you have issues you can escalate them for further action. As you may be aware this process has posed some challenges where providers have got a large number of associated providers that they’re needing to potentially change. We know that the current process is not ideal particularly when you’re needing to do bulk changes, and that we’re actively looking to find a better way of allowing you to submit this information and we will keep updating you as that change comes online.
Now before I finish up today I just want to emphasise that you as a registered provider are accountable for the services your associated provider delivers on your behalf. So any care or services delivered through an associated provider is still seen as being delivered by you the registered provider. You’re also responsible for care delivered by other parties that the associated provider engages for example through a subcontracting arrangement. So this means that you can’t transfer legal obligations as a registered provider to an associated provider. You must have processes and systems in place to make sure that your associated providers comply with the requirements under the Act and deliver their services consistent with the Statement of Rights.
In addition workers employed or engaged by an associated provider are considered to be aged care workers of you the registered provider. The registered provider remains responsible for ensuring these workers comply with worker screening requirements, the Aged Care Code of Conduct and other relevant workforce obligations. So for example as a registered provider you still have an obligation to make sure your associated provider’s workers are screened and suitable to work in aged care. This is because registered providers must make sure that all their aged care workers including those delivering services through an associated provider meet the worker screening requirements.
People engaged or employed by an associated provider may also meet the definition of a responsible person under section 11 of the Act, for example Directors of Nursing or Facility Managers, and may be subject to additional obligations as a result and you must make sure you’re aware if this applies. As a general rule anything done or not done by an associated provider should be treated as being done or not done by you as the registered provider. This includes for the purposes of compliance with provider obligations. Because you as the registered provider remain accountable for services delivered by an associated provider at the Commission we very much expect you to have adequate assurance systems and processes in place that give you effective oversight and allow you to monitor the care being delivered by your associated providers. It’s important that you’re able to assure yourself and the Commission that services delivered are compliant with all relevant obligations.
Now just finally before we jump into questions I’d just like to highlight three resources for you that you’ll be able to access via the QR codes that you see on the screen. The first QR code links to an FAQ sheet that we’ve developed based on commonly asked questions related to associated providers. The second QR code links to our regulatory bulletin on associated providers that we released in October of this year. This goes into more detail on some of the things that we’ve talked about today. The third QR code will take you to our website and step you through the process around what you need to do when notifying us of changes to your associated provider relationships and it’s useful for you to refer to.
Now I’m going to hand back to Rob.
Robert Day:
[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘Panel Q&A’, ‘health.gov.au/aged-care-reforms’, ’10 December 2025’]
Thanks very much Sarah and thanks Simon as well. All right. We’re going to jump into some questions now. And as I mentioned at the start we have grouped up some of the themes from our pre-submitted questions and we’ll run quickly through those and then we’ll get to the live Q&A. So the first of the pre-submitted questions is coming your way Simon and it’s:
Q: Can you tell us about the record keeping requirements for aged care workers and responsible persons and how they’ve been strengthened under the Aged Care Rules?
Simon Christopher:
Get myself off mute. Thanks Rob. Providers have record keeping obligations in relation to worker screening under the Aged Care Act even where the worker is engaged through an associated provider. Registered providers that deliver funded aged care services through an associated provider must have governance arrangements in place to make sure that the worker screening requirements are being met. These governance arrangements could be checking that workers meet the screening requirements as part of the hiring or engagement processes, using system controls or alerts to make sure that workers continue to meet their screening requirements and doing random checks of worker records for your workforce or associated providers. Thanks Rob.
Robert Day:
Thanks very much Simon. The second of our pre-submitted questions is coming your way Kristian.
Q: Why when an individual meets the definition of both an associated provider and an aged care worker under the Act is the Commission considering the individual to be an aged care worker?
Kristian Wynn:
Thanks Rob. I’m really glad to get this question actually because it lets us kind of dive into the detail here. So as the people on the webinar are likely aware the definition of the associated provider or of an associated provider in the legislation is quite broad when read in isolation. So the Commission’s had to apply a bit of a narrower interpretation. But this is consistent with the intent of the legislation. The explanatory memorandum to the Aged Care Bill for example specifically refers to associated providers as organisations that deliver services on behalf of a registered provider and it would be a perverse outcome for all aged care workers to be also classified as associated providers which would be a risk if we didn’t consider the two classifications to be mutually exclusive kind of at any one time and any one capacity.
So to answer the question the reason that aged care worker definition kind of trumps the associated provider definition is that there are specific obligations that attach to aged care workers that are crucial for ensuring the quality and the safety of the services that are being delivered. So for example workers need to be appropriately screened, trained and qualified and comply with the Code but there are no direct obligations placed on associated providers. They may have contractual obligations obviously with their registered provider but all the statutory obligations rest with the registered provider themselves. So when an individual is directly delivering care to an older person it’s really important to be very clear that the obligations around screening, training, the Code all apply to that individual which is why the aged care worker definition is really important.
The general rule of thumb, if I can advance a general rule of thumb, is a bit of a two stage test. If you’re trying to work out whether someone is acting as an aged care worker or an associated provider firstly you would ask yourself are they delivering a service on the service list for which you’re as a registered provider being funded. If the answer’s no you can just stop there. They’re neither an aged care worker nor an associated provider if they’re not delivering a funded aged care service. Then you probably need to ask are they overseeing the delivery of those services, like someone mentioned, as a business owner, or are they actually delivering them personally. If they’re delivering them personally, if they’re in the room delivering the service, they’re doing so as an aged care worker. If they are overseeing others deliver the care as the business owner, like for instance a sole trader who employs people, in that case they’re playing the role of an associated provider.
Now this test will cover a significant majority of individuals operating in aged care however we are absolutely aware that due to the range of different kind of care delivery models and contexts there will inevitably be a kind of slither of grey in certain circumstances. This is unfortunately a bit of an inevitable consequence of using these kind of blanket constructs to try and cover a very diverse sector. But ultimately whether an individual is an associated provider or an aged care worker only really matters for the purpose of the obligations that flow from it. So broadly these kind of fall into two buckets. One is your workforce obligations which includes ensuring all of your workers are screened and appropriately trained and qualified and comply with the Code and other kind of relevant conduct obligations, and the other kind of broad bucket is your reporting and your notification obligations which require you to let us know about your relationship with associated providers – by us I mean the Commission – and to let older people know when you’re using associated providers to deliver their services in those Service Agreements.
So as long as you make sure that any individual who is personally and directly delivering aged care services to older people is screened and they’re appropriately trained and qualified and they’re complying with the Code you’ll be looking pretty good for your compliance with your workforce obligations. Now if you also make sure that you keep a list of any organisations you’re contracting with who are responsible for delivering services on your behalf – and by that I mean who have employees who deliver those services beyond just the business owner – that is functionally your list of associated providers for the purposes of your reporting or notification obligations.
And just to kind of contextualise this a bit I guess the primary reason associated providers exist as a concept is to make sure your accountability as registered providers extends all the way down to the point of service delivery even where those services are being provided by third parties. That’s the really important part of this whole construct. And to be perfectly candid for just a moment we’re not going to come down hard on anyone for characterising a particular individual one way or the other where it’s a bit of a border call, provided your workforce obligations are being met. So for example we’re aware that there are sole trader allied health professionals for example who may deliver services personally alongside an assistant or an offsider who is kind of one of their employees. And in which case you could make the argument that they’re both an associated provider in one capacity and kind of an aged care worker in the other at the same time. As far as we’re concerned as the regulator if they deliver the care personally regardless of whether or not they’re bringing an offsider along, they’re an aged care worker and all those aged care worker obligations apply. If on the other hand obviously they normally kind of stay in the office and send their staff out, they’re probably closer to an associated provider. When you’re considering your reporting obligations you should go with whatever characterisation is most accurate at the time you are reporting. And really in any case the most important thing is that you’re making sure the individuals delivering care are screened, appropriately trained and qualified and complying with the Code. I think I may have gone on a bit of a tangent there but like I said I was excited to hear the question come in. So I will throw back to Robert.
Robert Day:
Thanks Kristian. Look I really appreciated hearing the detail and I hope the participants on the call did as well. I think really useful to hear you explain the Commission’s thinking and that detail. So thank you. Another pre-submitted question coming back your way Simon.
Q: What documentation is needed for registered providers to show their associated providers are complying with the requirements under the new Act?
Simon Christopher:
Thanks Rob. Under the new Act associated provider is defined as we’ve mentioned as an entity engaged in conduct under an arrangement with a registered provider in relation to their delivery of funded aged care services. So I think the primary point – and I’ll go into a bit more detail here – is how the registered provider must have arrangements and record keeping mechanisms in place to demonstrate that aged care workers engaged through third party arrangements meet relevant workforce requirements. How that is operationalised is absolutely a matter for that registered provider but they do need to be satisfying themselves that those obligations are met. The registered provider as we’ve talked through in the presentation remains responsible for ensuring their associated providers comply with all relevant requirements under the Aged Care Act and Rules and these are all designed to ensure the quality and safety of that service delivery.
While the Act makes it a requirement of the registered provider to ensure compliance it again doesn’t specify the way in which the registered provider should do so. Providers should have regard to the Act and Rules to fully understand the requirements that apply. And again I’ll make another plug for a tool close to my heart. The Aged Care Provider Requirement Search Tool, it will help you navigate directly to your service offering and those requirements which have been created and applied in a proportionate manner to the services that you deliver. So really encourage you to connect with that and I’m sure the team can drop something back in the chat for the group as well. Thanks Rob.
Robert Day:
Thanks very much Simon. Okay. So let’s jump now into the live part of the Q&A. And the top question I’ve got there is from Tiana. And I might just sort of both quickly summarise as best I can but also offer an answer to a question a bit further down from Kye about meal providers because I think that will provide some context. So thanks Tiana for that really detailed question. I think to start with the answer to Kye’s question, we do see meal services as associated providers and that’s because if you look at the definition of meals in the service list it talks about preparing and packing and delivering a meal. And that is very much what you’d expect Lite n’ Easy or one of the other meal providers to do.
I think we are cognisant of what some of the challenges that might then mean to go to Tiana’s question in terms of documenting the workforce, and continue to think about how we can simplify that in the best possible way we can. So I guess want to acknowledge the suggestion there and say yes we’ll continue to think about that and provide some clarification with the Commission on how to handle meals providers. And thank you. That’s a really timely suggestion.
In terms of the first part of Tiana’s question about why is it necessary for an associated provider who is also a registered provider to provide some of these details, colleagues on the call would any of you like to add an answer in that space?
Simon Christopher:
I might venture a view. Sorry. Thanks Sarah. And then please add to it because I’m sure you’ll have some specific views about it. I think in the last question that I responded to how a provider satisfies themselves through their arrangements that the workers of their associated provider are meeting those obligations to some extent we’re agnostic to. I will pass over to Sarah because as the regulator the Commission when they come out will obviously want to see that you have satisfied yourself and can evidence those requirements to them. But to a large extent we’re not trying to prescribe exactly what that looks like in your particular circumstances because as Kristian mentioned it can be quite varied what some of those arrangements are. Sarah did you have anything you want to add to that?
Sarah Kelly:
Yeah. And I guess there’s a couple of things here and I can appreciate how in some circumstances it feels like a bit of double handling for people. So I guess a couple of things I would say. Sometimes the way in which people are employed by an associated provider/registered provider are working with a different entity can be different. They’re not necessarily always doing the same role. So I think if we step back to sort of go why do we have these requirements in place – and it is in simple terms to assure things like people who are delivering aged care services are screened, they’re appropriate people, they’ve got the appropriate qualifications and so on to deliver that care. Because it’s not always a one for one, that people are a registered provider and an associated provider. And that’s why the obligations exist sort of separately to that registration as well.
I appreciate and I know that there have been quite a few questions around particularly for example if you know somebody is a registered provider and you know your people are screened and then they’re operating as an associated provider somewhere else, why do we have to do this again. Again it flows back to that same thing around what’s sitting behind that. And what sits behind it is that the registered provider in all instances is responsible for assuring themselves that the services being delivered on their behalf are being delivered in accordance with the obligations under the Act. So that’s why it flows through as well.
Robert Day:
Thanks Sarah.
Kristian Wynn:
Just to add I suppose a bit of an example into Sarah’s comment. We know that for instance there are registered providers that deliver certain services in house but then are kind of contracted by other registered providers as associated providers to deliver slightly different services. So just to provide a bit of an example, they may well have assured themselves as registered providers that their staff are appropriately trained and qualified to deliver their in house services, but that won’t necessarily serve as adequate assurance for you when you’re using them for a different role or when you’re using staff of that provider for a different role that they’re appropriately trained and qualified to perform those services.
So as Sarah mentioned at the end of the day the registered provider is responsible for making sure that all those obligations are met, we would just want to specify that for some particular requirements like screening the requirements are a bit tighter. So if any of you have your Aged Care Rules open in front of you section 154-905 – don’t worry. I think this is being recorded so you can look it up later – but it mandates that registered providers must keep certain records about all their aged care workers which would obviously include workers of associated providers that are delivering care on your behalf specifically concerning those screening checks.
So you can take assurances or attestations or declarations for some things, like for instance everyone’s done their first aid checks for instance, but for things like police certificates you need to maintain a record of the worker’s clearance documents yourself which might be their police certificate or their statutory declaration or their NDIS clearance decision, whichever is applicable. So there are some differences in what you can kind of take an attestation or a declaration for as evidence versus what you can’t. Obviously we’re not going to be able to go through line by line every bit of the relevant legislation right now in this forum but that is just the only little asterisk I would add next to some of those previous answers.
And that’s all.
Robert Day:
Thanks. Thanks Kristian. That’s useful. I think I’ll group together two more questions from the live Q&A and I think it expands on the conversation we’ve just started. So one from Executive Quality and Education.
Q: What evidence do registered providers need to hold for associated providers that fall as aged care workers?
But also then a question from Linda which I think is our top upvoted question at the moment.
Q: Can associated providers supply a stat dec to share police or NDIS checks and qualifications for workers?
Sarah Kelly:
Kristian do you want to start on that one and I’ll jump in?
Kristian Wynn:
So to kind of follow on from my last answer I guess, I think we would obviously be expecting providers to comply with their record keeping obligations to the letter. If something is explicitly required of you under your record keeping obligations you’ll need to comply with those obligations. And that includes things like keeping a record of your workers’ names, date of birth and address, keeping a record of how you’ve ensured that the worker has appropriate qualifications, skills or experience. So again that doesn’t necessarily need to be you’ve got a copy of their various certificates or Cert IIIs in whatever or their ATAR scores. But what you need to make sure is recorded is how you’ve gone about as a registered provider assuring yourself that they are in fact appropriately qualified or skilled or experienced to do that work. That might be relying on evidence or declarations that the provider has given you. Absolutely. Or you might have other methods of assurance that you use there as well.
What you do need to keep that record of, like I was saying before, is their clearance documents, whether that be their police certificate or their NDIS check or their stat dec that serves as that interim kind of stopgap measure while their police check is pending and while their NDIS check is pending. Those are things that you are required to keep a record of. So unfortunately it is not a kind of binary yay or nay but certainly there are opportunities to assure yourselves in ways other than sighting the physical, original document and keeping that in a drawer somewhere.
Robert Day:
Thanks Kristian. And I might just jump to Jerry’s question because I think it lets us draw that out a little bit further. Alison I have seen your question on the OT and I will definitely come to it. So Jerry’s question is about whether we think it’s realistic for registered providers to check every staff member of an associated provider. And that could be hundreds of staff. And I think Kristian that goes to the point you were just making about there are different ways for registered providers to assure themselves. Is there anything you’d like to add to further go down that pathway?
Kristian Wynn:
I think without starting any fights here I think there is a degree to which we expect providers to be aware of whether the workers that they are using to provide care to vulnerable people are suitable to in fact provide that care. So without access to some of that information about your aged care workers it would be difficult to understand for instance how you would be ensuring for example that they’re not listed on the banning order register, or how you would ensure that they’re not being identified in kind of repeated allegations of misconduct or involved in reportable incidents. So there is kind of a minimum amount of information that we would expect you to have on the people who are delivering care and services on your behalf to make sure that those care and services are being delivered in a quality safe way.
That is not to say – like I was saying before that is absolutely not to say that you need to have a copy of every single piece of documentation that relates to every single one of your workers and keep it in some filing cabinet somewhere. But yes. If you have hundreds of workers who are working for you we would absolutely expect you to be able to exercise a degree of oversight over those workers that ensures the care they’re delivering on your behalf is safe and is of the quality that it needs to be.
Robert Day:
Thanks Kristian. I think that’s a really good answer in terms of balancing those two considerations. Yes we can be reasonable and proportionate where you’ve got a huge associated provider workforce that you’ve got different ways of assuring yourself. But ultimately the work of the associated provider and the work of its workers are your work for regulatory purposes when they’re delivering aged care services on your behalf.
All right. I promised I’d come back to Alison’s question so let’s do that. Alison is asking as an OT and an associated provider for multiple Support at Home providers whether we have a plan to streamline the work – that she and I assume other associated providers might have similar feedback – so they’re not having to report the same information to multiple registered providers. I don’t know colleagues on the call if there’s anything you’d be able to offer Alison in response to that question?
Sarah Kelly:
I can have a crack Rob. I suspect Alison might have guessed the answer just based on what Kristian’s just explained. And again I think it goes back to probably the nature of the information. If we’re talking about worker screening information at this point in time I think it’s very possible that you may have to provide that to each of the registered providers that you’re working with, whether or not in the future there is a way of standardising that. I think that’s probably where we’re looking to the sort of future worker screening reforms which will facilitate that but certainly at the moment it may well be that yes you’re having to share that information across more than one. And I think as well I guess what we want to go back to here is that I appreciate that in some instances these arrangements are administratively – they can be a bit of a burden to you. But that is not the intent behind where they’ve been sort of set up. It really is very much about making sure that any time that we’ve got workers that are particularly interacting with our elders in the community, that they’re appropriately trained, that they’re appropriately screened.
And again most of these should be one off interactions where you’re sharing information and then as you continue that relationship with that registered provider that information is recorded or the way by which they’ve assured themselves of it is complete and then you can move on to delivering the services for them.
Robert Day:
Thanks Sarah. I think that is a really good point in terms of it’s a really intense point in time right now with the Act just starting because we’re having to do it all for the first time. But at the same time Alison take your feedback on and we will continue to think about ways that we can reduce that impost to the extent possible. Some of it might be standardised and so you’re being asked for the same thing. Long term there might be some IT solutions as well. I can’t promise that to you at this point but we have heard the feedback and it’s something that we’re thinking about.
Margaret’s question I think is a good one too in terms of:
Q: Is there a flowchart available to assist providers to go through the criteria so that they can determine associated provider, aged care worker, registered provider?
Kristian Wynn:
I just actually jumped into Margaret’s comment there and just made an observation it was a really good suggestion. I think we are absolutely looking at making enhancements to our current regulatory bulletin on associated providers and I think some kind of decision tree or flowchart or kind of rough guidance on how to filter down to what definition is applicable in any given circumstance is a really good idea. So I think we will look to include something like that in the next update for the regulatory bulletin. I think that’s a great suggestion Margaret. Thank you.
Sarah Kelly:
Rob I did just want to emphasise a point Kristian made before and that is the Commission is going to be far more concerned if a registered provider hasn’t assured themselves for example around the worker screening status of workers that are delivering services for them through an associated provider than if they’ve kind of got it a bit wrong in interpreting whether or not they’re an associated provider or not and haven’t reported them through to us. So we understand there are going to be grey zones in that space and really what we just want you to drive back to again and again and again is the rationale of what’s sitting behind the requirements, so making sure that those people however they’re delivering those services for you, assuring yourself that they are sort of fit and proper and able to do that for you.
Robert Day:
Thanks Sarah. I am conscious of time. We’re at 2:51 so let’s try and do a quick rapid fire round to run the quiz show out. A question from Gianne about indirect transport and whether that makes an Uber service or a taxi service associated providers. I think the quick answer I can give you there is no and the reason for that is the interpretation of the service is the provision of the voucher in that case rather than the drive. And that’s the reason why we say that taxi drivers and Uber drivers aren’t associated providers.
A question from Skye.
Q: Do registered providers need to obtain consent from their associated provider before registering their details?
Sarah Kelly:
That’s an excellent question. I think the way in which the Commission – for example if you’re reporting that information to us, the Commission is obviously covered under and bound by the privacy requirements under the Act and also under the Privacy Act itself in relation to our ability to collect, to store, to use, to publish information. I would suggest that as registered providers when you’re engaging with your associated providers that you would want to turn your mind to considering the arrangements for how you make sure people are aware of the responsibilities that rest on you that you’ll then pass on to them through your arrangements with them, and the kind of information that may be shared. And I presume that that will also relate to making it clear perhaps to workers that things like their worker screening documentation, that if you’re going to engage in that relationship with a registered provider that that information would also need to be shared. I would say yes there’s absolutely responsibilities on you there but again as with all things I would say that transparency and being open and addressing these issues, that there should be a pathway through which you can navigate.
Robert Day:
Thanks Sarah. Next question from Stephen is:
Q: Are AT – I assume this is assistive technology – suppliers considered associated providers when they supply and deliver goods only?
And then a follow up question around installation and where that applies, whether that falls on the line.
Sarah Kelly:
I’m looking meaningfully at Simon and Kristian. I don’t know if they can - - -
Kristian Wynn:
I’m looking meaningfully at Simon to be honest.
Simon Christopher:
Thanks colleagues. Look I think if the good is defined on the service list then it will be part of that. So I would encourage you to go back to the service list and look at how that’s defined. I don’t have it right in front of me. But I think the other thing to think about is that continuum of care. So if you’re part of a process that delivers care, so you might need wound management materials as part of wound management care, the product or that good that you might purchase through that supply chain to deliver the service won’t necessarily be captured as a service but the actual care element will be. AT will have kind of variations of that continuum. So I don’t want to categorically say one way or the other but I’m sure we could take that one on board as part of our wrap up of Q&As to make sure that we connect with our Support at Home colleagues to not lead anyone astray.
Robert Day:
Thanks Simon. Let’s do that. Next question from Gianne is around registered providers who access workers through digital platforms like Mable. I think my quick answer would be Mable definitely. Some of the other online digital platforms I guess are akin to a labour hire firm and so they’re not necessarily an associated provider of you as the registered provider but their workers are aged care workers, your aged care workers.
There are obligations specifically on that digital platform that they have screened the people that are demonstrated as being suitable to work in aged care and that they’re publishing that information. There’s also requirements on the digital platform that they’re keeping information about things like incidents and complaints and passing that onto you so that you can as the registered provider fulfil your obligations.
My understanding in that context would be that the agreement would be between the digital platform and the worker rather than between the registered provider and the worker. But I don’t know Simon or Kristian or Sarah if you want to again save me on that advice.
Simon Christopher:
I might just add Rob I think what we have absolutely tried – well what we’ve sought to achieve in the Rules and the Act in relation to directly sourcing a worker from an older person – and I’m pretty sure the Support at Home Manual talks to this – is that you need to engage with your registered provider who’d be funding that care to ensure that that registered provider still treats the aged care worker as part of their responsibility. So it’s tying up what was a bit of a grey area to make sure that anyone who’s accessing aged care workers from digital platforms has the same safeguards being applied to that workforce, and as you’ve already mentioned the display requirements around worker screening etcetera. That’s probably all I’d add Rob.
Robert Day:
Thanks Simon. And look probably the last question that we’ve got time for today is Rami’s around setting meal prices where the associated provider might offer a range of different meal and drink options and so the price is different, and can they promote the pricing as per quote plus 10%. I’ll have a quick crack at this colleagues and then you can correct me again if I’m wrong. I think there’s probably two parts of the answer Rami. One is in terms of how do you engage with the individual older person, what do you put in your Service Agreement, maybe what you put on your external website. And I think in that case it is okay to explain that, the individual have the chance to choose off a menu and that you will charge them that price plus 10%. There are obligations to report your Support at Home pricing to the Department and that gets published on My Aged Care. I can’t remember the exact words in the Rules but it is something like the most common price point for that service. And so you’ll have to make a judgment for that part of your obligation in terms of whether there’s a common price or a standard price that you can use as that most common. And I think that will become a little bit easier as we get into the system because you’ll know from experience what that common price point is centring around.
Look I’m going to have to call it there because we’re at 2:58. Thank you all very much for your participation. Thank you for your questions. Thank you for your valuable and interesting feedback and constructive suggestions that have come through that Q&A as well. I think we have found that really valuable. I hope that those of you watching have as well.
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A couple of closing remarks. We’d really appreciate it if you could complete a short survey to help us improve our webinars. And the link to that survey is now pinned at the top of the Q&A function and it will also be sent to you in a post-webinar email. The survey is only four questions and it will take a minute or two to answer. So thank you very much for that feedback as well. Thank you all very much for attending today. I hope it’s been valuable for you. We really do appreciate the work that all of you operating in the aged care system are doing. We know it is a time of significant change and that brings with it effort and energy. But thank you very much. Enjoy the rest of your afternoon and we’ll talk again soon.
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