Commonwealth Home Support Programme (CHSP) – Sector readiness – Webinar

Commonwealth Home Support Program (CHSP) 2025-27 Sector Readiness Webinar 

Thursday, 12 June 2025 

Presented by: 

 Chair: Claudia Dukats 

Acting Assistant Secretary, Home Support Operations Branch, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing  

Speakers: 
Christian Hesse 
Executive Director, Quality Assessment and Monitoring Group, Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission 

Rob Day 
Assistant Secretary, Harmonisation and Regulatory Strategy Branch, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing 

Martin Dempsey 
Director, Home Support Operations Branch, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing 

Nicholle Zervos 
Acting Director, Home Support Operations Branch, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing 

[Opening visual of slide with text saying ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’, ‘Commonwealth Home Support Program (CHSP) 2025-27’, ‘Sector readiness webinar’, ‘12 June 2025’, ‘agedcareengagement.health.gov.au’, ’12 June 2025’] 

[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] 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thank you for attending today’s webinar. My name is Claudia Dukats. I am Acting Assistant Secretary, Home Support Operations Branch from the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. I’ll begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land which we are virtually meeting today. I am based in Canberra on the lands of the Ngunnawal people. I acknowledge and pay respect to their continuing culture and the contribution they make to the life of this city and to this region. I also extend that acknowledgment and respect to other families with a connection to this region and to any other Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people who are here with us today. 

Today I am joined by two members of the Home Support Operations Branch, Martin Dempsey, Director, CHSP Operations, and Nicholle Zervos, Acting Director, CHSP Service Reform. I also have my colleague Rob Day, Assistant Secretary, Harmonisation and Regulation Strategy Branch, and Christian Hesse, Acting Executive Director, Regulatory Operations Division from the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. 

Today’s presentation is for Commonwealth Home Support Program providers about the changes to the CHSP from 1 July 2025 with the introduction of new Funding Agreements for the next two years and further requirements with the new Aged Care Act now coming into effect on 1 November as announced last week. 

Thank you for accommodating the change in the webinar date following last week’s announcement about the commencement of the new Act being briefly deferred, for sending in your questions and for making the time to attend today. 

Before we start some housekeeping matters. There is no option for attendees to turn on their video or microphone. There will be a Q&A session at the end of the webinar. We invite you to submit some additional questions noting we have received over 150 questions before the webinar. We have incorporated into the presentation to respond to some of these questions. At the beginning of the Q&A session we will start by addressing the most frequently asked questions that were submitted. We will then move to questions that you asked during the webinar where we have time. You can submit questions in Slido on the right hand side of your screen and we will attempt to respond to as many questions as possible. We will also be publishing a summary frequently asked questions document shortly after the webinar which will respond to the questions submitted before the webinar and to any questions we don’t get to today. 

Webinar slides are now available on our website. This session is being recorded and will be published on our website in the coming days. We will also release a provider update shortly while you are waiting for the recording to become available. This is intended as a follow up to key questions we received throughout the webinar registration process. 

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Commonwealth Home Support Program’, ‘Preparing for 1 July 2025’] 

As you now may be aware implementation of the Aged Care Act 2024 has been briefly deferred to 1 November 2025. This was announced on 4 June 2025 by Minister Butler with letters to providers and older Australians from Minister for Aged Care and Seniors the Honourable Sam Rae MP. Regardless the Commonwealth Home Support Program is continuing as a grant funded program until it transitions to Support at Home no earlier than 1 July 2027. We know the most frequently asked questions are around what’s changing from 1 July and what’s changing when the Act commences from 1 November. We have heard your concerns and we will cover this in detail throughout the presentation. 

As outlined in previous webinars we’ve held in October last year and in March of this year there are some changes to the program under the new 2025-27 Funding Agreement that come into effect on 1 July. The CHSP 2025-27 Grant Agreement offers are being sent to providers. To continue to be able to offer services to CHSP clients please sign and return your Grant Agreement prior to 1 July. This will ensure that the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing can execute your Grant Agreement so funding continues over the next two years. These Agreements are being executed by the Department upon their return. If you haven’t heard from us by the 16th of June please contact your funding arrangement manager. 

I would like to reassure CHSP providers that the CHSP continues to be a grant funded program providing block funding to eligible providers. Payments from the Department will continue to be made monthly in arrears and a national unit price range continues to apply for each service type. Providers will continue to set their own client contributions as per existing CHSP policies. 

Despite the brief deferment of the Act providers should already be preparing for some program changes in line with the requirements outlined in your new Agreements. Some service types have been remapped or renamed. The CHSP 2025-27 Service Catalogue is available as a quick reference guide to understand the changes to CHSP services. Understanding these changes is important for your Grant Agreement, your performance reporting in the Data Exchange or DEX, and for client service referrals. 

Flexibility provisions will continue as we know this is an effective way for providers to move funds to meet service demand. There are some other program and service changes which will be covered shortly. 

Next is client assessments. As we have always reminded providers and as outlined in all CHSP Manuals clients should complete a My Aged Care assessment to receive Government funded services including CHSP. To reinforce this providers will need to collect and record their client’s My Aged Care ID in their own client management systems until the functionality to collect this information is available in the Data Exchange or DEX later in 2025-26. Most importantly CHSP clients will continue to receive their services as they currently do if they are registered with My Aged Care and assessed. 

Lastly the 2025-27 Agreements include new reporting requirements. The Child Safety Annual Statement of Compliance is a new Commonwealth reporting requirement which was included in the recent May CHSP provider update under CHSP Reforms on the Department’s website. The existing annual financial declaration must also include a Statement of Compliance that CHSP grant funding has only been spent on assessed and eligible CHSP clients. 

Further information and resources about these requirements will be available shortly in another provider update and in the interim CHSP Manual which will be available by 1 July 2025. 

With the program changes according to the 25-27 Agreements there are some minor adjustments in our approach towards program assurance for activities delivered from 1 July. 

My Aged Care or MAC ID. As has always been written in the CHSP Manual only registered and assessed clients should receive Government subsidised CHSP services. A new requirement is that providers will need to record clients’ MAC IDs against services delivered in your own client management systems. This will allow the Department to assure that services are being delivered in line with the program’s policies. From January 2026 this will be part of your ongoing DEX reporting requirement. From 1 July if you haven’t already been doing this providers should start recording clients’ MAC IDs in your own reporting systems until this functionality becomes available in DEX. 

CHSP compliance review. There is ongoing contract management of CHSP grants through providers’ community grants hub funding arrangement managers. Providers should only be delivering services that they are contracted to deliver and use funding to provide services to assess CHSP clients. In addition CHSP providers should already be familiar with the compliance process the Department initiates annually which looks at use of funds, service delivery and use of flexibility across the grant. As there is a four month gap between changes required by the program and by the Act we will be running a modified compliance process to account for these changes and the change in the description of service types in the new Agreements. We will provide more information about the activities we will assure in the coming months. 

Before I hand over to my fellow presenters today I want to remind CHSP providers that currently the obligations for CHSP providers are set out in individual agreements between the Department and the provider and explained in the Program Manual. When the new Act commences on 1 November there will be other changes such as additional provider obligations which will be set out in the Rules as well as in the Program Manual.  

In preparation for the Act commencement on 1 November please consider provider regulation. The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission will have enhanced powers under the new legislation. Providers need to be aware of these powers and their impacts when the Act commences. Provider deeming. CHSP providers will be deemed once the Act commences. Providers will need to meet the obligations as per their registration category. My Aged Care. Providers should only deliver Government subsidised CHSP services to clients who are registered on My Aged Care. This is a requirement now and will continue once the Act commences. Providers should support and refer clients for an assessment as soon as possible to ensure service continuity and in preparation for the Act commencing. 

Service Agreements. When the Act commences all CHSP providers will be required to have in place a Service Agreement with their clients. These requirements largely reflect what you should already have in place with your existing clients to ensure they know the services they will be receiving and what they will be expected to contribute. We are expecting transitional arrangements to be in place for existing clients to allow providers 12 months to have a Service Agreement in place. All new clients will need to have a Service Agreement in place however. This requirement will not commence on 1 July and will commence when the Act starts from 1 November 2025. We will provide further guidance material to support you in the lead up to 1 November. 

Statement of Rights. Many of you have asked whether this comes into effect from 1 July under CHSP. The answer is no. This will come into effect from 1 November and further information will be available in the coming months. We will also continue to release further information as the draft Rules are finalised. 

Finally a few key reminders. To prepare for 1 July be aware of key program arrangements from 1 July, new service list and descriptions about what’s included and what’s excluded. Collect your client MAC IDs in your own client management systems in preparation for this functionality in DEX from January 2026. Ensure your clients are assessed to continue receiving subsidised services. 

What’s changing from 1 November? There will be changes due to the commencement of the Act. We will support providers with guidance material in the lead up to 1 November. However key notable changes will be the introduction of Service Agreements, changes to worker screening, changes to the eligibility criteria for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 45 to 49 years and experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness, provider deeming arrangements and obligations. 

Interactions with CHSP and Support at Home. Noting these will be detailed in the 1 November Manual. 

Other program changes due to the Act. These will be outlined in the provider guidance material in the coming months. That’s all from me today and I will now hand over to Martin for further details on the 2025-27 extension.  

Martin Dempsey: 

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘CHSP 2025-27 extension’, ‘2025-27 grant agreements’, ‘DEX changes’, ‘Key program changes from 1 July 2025’] 

Thanks Claudia and good afternoon everyone. So my name’s Martin Dempsey. I’m the Director of the CHSP Operations. Today I’m going to be covering off the 2025-27 extension with the Grant Agreements, DEX changes and some key program changes from 1 July 2025. 

Before I go into the details of the new Agreements I just want to do some general housekeeping matters for the current 24-25 Agreement. The final payment which is in providers’ Agreements for the 30th of June is actually going to be released slightly early. So providers will start to see them coming in from the 23rd of June. As it is a new Agreement from 1 July and this Agreement is going to be finalising unspent funds cannot be carried over into the new Agreement. So please make sure that you’re aware of that. Any unspent funds from this year will not be carried over into next year which means that we would be recovering this through a DTI, a debtor tax invoice arrangement.  

As for the new 25-27 Agreements offers have started going out. Don’t be concerned if you haven’t received it yet. We’re expecting all of them to be out by Monday next week. There are over 1,300 providers delivering services so it does take a bit of time for them to be offered out there. But you should be seeing them if you haven’t already by Monday next week. 

As mentioned in previous webinars I’d like to highlight some of the key elements for your 25-27 Agreements. There have been quite a few questions and I’ve also seen them pop up in the Slido already that I just want to clarify. In regards to funding CHSP continues to be block funded. It is being paid the same as it is as the moment which is payments made at the end of the month. CHSP does continue to have its own service catalogue noting it is changed. So there is the service catalogue on our Department’s website. This is going to be reflected also in your Agreements. So the new Agreements that are being issued at the moment are mapped to the new service types. There is also the national unit price range which continues to apply for all of the service types that do have a unit price range added to it. 

The exception regarding the service list which is also outlined in the service catalogue is meals delivery and meals preparation, individual social support and group social support are funded to providers at the individual service level, which is the next level down, compared to the Support at Home service type. This is outlined in the service catalogue. 

In regards to DEX – and there’s been a lot of questions about DEX so it’s good to clear up some of this – DEX stage one, which is basically the mapping exercise, starts on 1 July. It aligns to the providers’ Agreements out there and what you’re funded for and then the reporting. So it starts from 1 July. The delay of the Aged Care Act doesn’t impact that at all. When you go on through the DEX online you’ll be able to actually see – you can already see the previews for the new service types in there so I definitely recommend that you do visit the DEX sandpit arrangements. DEX from January 2026 will have the ability for providers to report their My Aged Care IDs through data uploads. What we’re asking at the moment is that providers record the My Aged Care ID in your own client management system and the ability to report it through DEX will come into effect in January where you’ll be able to then upload them. So it will be able to also be linked to the statistical linkage key which is already there against the clients. 

Monthly reporting and performance continues which has been fantastic in terms of being able to see all the services that are being provided at the moment in a regular monthly arrangement which also allows us to be able to see the flows of when services drop and they increase as it does throughout the year. So performance reporting is monthly continuing as it is at the moment. At this time providers should be preparing for their outlets in DEX with new program activities and be able to report according to the new service catalogue. There’s the DEX provider hotline can also assist in some queries as well as with the toolkit that we have uploaded on our Department’s website. So the DEX toolkit stage one has been developed as a guide for providers and is available at the moment. It has IT and system actions needed to be able to align. As I said stage one, all it does is the mapping of the new service types. It doesn’t have the My Aged Care aspect in it in terms of the reporting. Both the stage one toolkit and the data dictionary are available on the Department’s website under the CHSP reforms and a link can be found at the end of this presentation. 

In regards to referrals with the delay of the Aged Care Act referrals will continue to come from the referral process from My Aged Care as they do now. Clients’ approvals and referrals for services will be on the current list of CHSP services. Providers will have to accept the services and then map to their new contracts. For instance home modification referrals will continue but the contract and reporting for DEX will be under home adjustments. 

There’s been a lot of questions about My Aged Care outlets and client transfers. We’ll be posting something on our CHSP resources next week but the Department has developed a process to be able to support providers where there’s been a change in provider exiting and a new provider coming in and where there needs to be significant clients transferred from one provider to another provider. The My Aged Care Contact Centre can assist providers in the process for small client number transfers but also where there’s large provider transfers, so a large number of clients that need to be done, there will be a direct email contact for providers to assist them and walk them through the process and what is required to make sure the data is as clean as possible to be able to actually transfer and when that can actually happen as well. And that’s the agedcare@health.gov.au email address and we will be providing that as well on our Department’s resource tab. 

In terms of your 25-27 Grant Agreements annual indexation has been applied for the 25-26 year. We’ve had a lot of questions to say why has it increased in the 26-27 year. It is at the same base as the 25-26 with the indexation that’s been applied. And later on, earlier in 2026, we will be advising what the indexation rate is for the 26-27 and that will automatically then be applied into your contract, as what has done previously. It’s just been some time since we’ve had multiple year contracts in the CHSP program. 

There has been a number of indexation boosts that will continue to apply in 25-26. They include the next two tranches of payment boost for aged care enrolled and registered nurses coming into effect in October this year and August 2026, as well as the Fair Work stage three boost for most aged care workers coming in from October. This is following the Government’s post-Budget announcement related to CHSP where previously we were doing it as a grant opportunity. We’re flowing it through through an indexation boost. More information will be coming out about that shortly. 

In regards to the Manual, so Claudia did mention about the Manual. We’re anticipating to have a draft Manual out. What we’re able to do is that – providers are really wanting to have the Manual. We understand this. But due to the brief deferment of the Act an interim CHSP 25-27 Manual will be available by the end of June covering the four month period. The Manual will look very similar to the current one that we’ve got at the moment but will cover off obviously the mapping of the new service types as well as any of the new reporting requirements that are required. There will be also additional guidance material on program changes available shortly to provide providers with clear guidance about the program from 1 July 2025. Once the draft Rules are finalised the Manual will then be updated to reflect the provider obligations and changes made based on the new Aged Care Act that will be coming into effect in November. Providers will be given an opportunity to provide feedback as what was the original intention mentioned in the last webinar to be able to inform that Manual. The new Manual covering the November 2025 through to 2027 will be available in October 2025 with the additional requirements underneath the Act as I just mentioned. 

On this slide I’m going to briefly highlight some of the program changes that will come into effect on 1 July. Most of these are already known and affect some of the providers out there. So in regards to the Modified Monash Model, so MMM, we’re including MMM5 which is small rural towns. Previously we had 6 and 7. As part of providers’ negotiations and establishment for the 25-27 Agreements most of this has already been incorporated and it will be in your Agreements from 1 July. That’s up to 20% loading.  

Home adjustments. The contribution will increase from $10,000 to $15,000 to align with the Support at Home ATHM Scheme. The notable difference with Support at Home is that the clients will have access to this contribution annually. So there is a slight difference there in between the Support at Home and the CHSP. 

Allied health clinical services. CHSP clients will still need to continue to contribute towards the cost of the services underneath the allied health clinical services from 1 July. Provider relinquishments. Any provider wishing to relinquish their CHSP funding must provide us with five months’ notice to the Department. This is really in order to allow for a streamlined relinquishment process to ensure that we can find alternative service providers and ensure client continuity. The Department will work towards two dates which is the 30th of June and the 31st of December. More information will be provided in the Manual about this. 

Flexibility provisions continue for most services. The additional service types needing written approval from the Department to be able to use the flexibility are equipment and products, former GEAT, home adjustments, former home modifications, specialist support services, sector support and development, hoarding and squalor and assistance for providers for these services. They will just need written approval if they would like to use the flexibility provisions underneath those service types. All the other ones remain the same as what we’ve got at the moment which is the 50% flexibility outlined in the existing Manual. 

As Claudia touched briefly on earlier the Child Safety Annual Statement of Compliance is a new Commonwealth Grant Agreement requirement. This is not intended to be onerous. Rather a light touch compliance requirement for CHSP providers. The annual financial declaration. This has already been done for the last ten years of the CHSP. What’s actually happening now is that as part of that financial declaration there’s going to be a Statement of Compliance saying that Commonwealth funding has been spent on assessed clients who are eligible to receive those services. 

Now I’m just going to be heading over to my colleague Nicholle in a second but I just want to touch on the key takeaways. Please return your signed Agreements. Obviously look over them, review them, make sure that they’re in line with what we sent out in the invitation to apply. But please return them as soon as possible. CHSP providers are continuing on a new service list from 1 July. Know your DEX reporting and compliance requirements for the service delivery. Record your client My Aged Care ID against the services provided in your own client management systems until the functionality becomes available in DEX in January. Look at the DEX stage one document and also the data dictionary regarding DEX. 

I’m going to now hand over to my colleague Nicholle. 

Nicholle Zervox: 

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘CHSP Services’, ‘Client transition and service updates’] 

Thank you Marty. Good afternoon everyone. I’m Nicholle Zervos and I am Acting Director of Policy Reform for CHSP Services. Thank you for listening in today. I’d like to provide an update on the consultation of specialised support services and sector support and development. I know you’re keen to understand where we’re up to with that. So specialised support service providers will continue to be funded through a separate schedule in their CHSP Agreement for one year. SSS or specialised support services is not included in Support at Home as you should already be aware.  

Shortly we will have to do some separate consultations with vision and dementia advisory service providers. We need to get a better understanding of what service activities they provide. That will help us to understand their activities better and identify any areas of duplication across any existing programs. We’ll continue to work with other CHSP providers to realign their services where possible to other service types under the new service list. We understand it’s not as simple and straightforward but we will do our best to work with you to finalise the mapping. More information about the consultations and the additional mapping will be shared with providers who deliver these services shortly. 

SSD. Current sector support and development providers, in home aged care providers, aged care peak and aged care consumer peak bodies will be invited to complete a survey later in August 2025. Information from the survey will inform development of an in aged care sector support program. We encourage you to contribute and provide feedback when we consult on the newly developed program. It’s important that you do participate in that to have your say. 

Assessed clients. Now the majority of CHSP clients will transition and continue to receive services that they are currently assessed for with the implementation of the new Act on 1 November. Providers do not need to do anything additional to support these clients to transition. As with the existing arrangements if a client’s care needs change significantly we encourage providers to send a support plan review request to an aged care assessor through My Aged Care and the support portal. It’s really important please. 

Unassessed clients. Thank you to the providers for supporting the unregistered and unassessed clients and assisting them to apply for an assessment. We recognise this took a big effort in a short timeframe on top of all the additional activities that you’re preparing yourselves for for these reforms. So very much appreciated. Despite the brief deferment of the Act unassessed clients will still need to be registered and assessed preferably well before 1 November. So please keep that momentum going. When we hit 1 July please don’t stop. Please keep working with your clients to get them registered and assessed. Under the new Act the minimum age to be eligible for aged care services will be 50 or over. This means that all CHSP clients aged between 45 and 49 must be registered and assessed before the new Act comes into effect on 1 November in order to continue receiving services without disruption. 

Grandfathered clients. There’s been some confusion with CHSP grandfathered clients and if they need to have an assessment. Absolutely they do. Grandfathered clients as well as all CHSP clients are required to have an aged care assessment to ensure they continue accessing Government funded aged care services. Grandfathered CHSP clients as we know were transitioned into CHSP from other aged care programs coming up to ten years ago now. We know that most of the grandfathered clients were given an aged care ID at the time or MAC ID when they came into the program, but we’ve found that many have since not had an assessment through My Aged Care. The My Aged Care Contact Centre scripting has been updated to assist in identifying and supporting grandfathered CHSP clients to obtain an assessment. If any grandfathered clients have been unsuccessful in speaking with the Contact Centre about getting an assessment we encourage the clients to please recontact the My Aged Care. So please providers help them to do that. 

We acknowledge that there are concerns about waiting periods to receive an assessment. The Department is working with assessment organisations to ensure that they have capacity to undertake assessments in the lead up to 1 November 2025. For any clients who need services urgently and won’t have their assessment completed by 1 November there’s always access to urgent service referrals if needed. 

You have also told us that some of your most vulnerable clients have additional barriers to getting an assessment. We will work with providers to support their clients in exceptional circumstances to ensure continuity of service. And we’ll have more information on that in the coming months. 

Key messages. Providers should only be providing services to clients that have had a My Aged Care assessment. Please continue to support those clients that are unregistered and unassessed to apply for an assessment well before 1 November. I reiterate that please. We’ve found that the number of unassessed and unregistered is not coming through as much as we would like and I know assessment organisations are ready and waiting for assessments to come through to them. 

I’d like to now hand over to Rob for his updates on provider obligations. Rob. 

Rob Day: 

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Provider obligations’, ‘Rob Day’, ‘Assistant Secretary, Harmonisation and Regulatory Strategy Branch’, ‘Overview of requirements for all providers’, ‘Obligations for CHSP providers relating to reporting, notifications & information’, ‘Update on deeming’] 

Thanks very much Nicholle. Great to be here everyone. We are running a little bit behind on our schedule so I’m going to truncate my remarks slightly. And Emma if you wouldn’t mind skipping me forward to slide 24 please. What I’ll do is I’ll focus quickly on some of the pre-submitted questions that people have sent through and then highlight some resources that we’ve got available to help CHSP providers understand the change that will come with the new Act on the 1st of November and being registered providers under the Act for the first time. 

So this slide will be familiar for many of you who’ve been part of previous webinars but it talks about the six registration categories under the new Act and the way that obligations are attached to those registration categories and the service types within them, and in particular the way that the Quality Standards start to gradually apply as you move into the higher categories and the more complex forms of care. 

I particularly wanted to call out a couple of questions that have been asked or pre-submitted for the webinar. One of those is around the way that Quality Standards apply and the audits will apply in particular for an organisation that is registered across multiple categories. And the answer there is that the obligation to meet the Quality Standards and the audits apply only to the service types that fall into the relevant registration categories. And so for example the Quality Standards won’t apply to home maintenance services or meal services that sit in category one even if that provider also delivers personal care services and is registered in category four. The audit would only apply in that situation to the personal care services that fall under category four. 

We’ve also had some questions around the clinical governance requirements for providers who are registered in category four and wanted to particularly call out the note that you’ll see on that slide that those clinical governance requirements only apply if your organisation delivers care management or restorative care service types. 

So moving on now to some of the resources that we’ve got available to help you. I’d really like to call out this booklet which you can see on the screen which is a great starting point for CHSP providers in preparation for 1 November and it outlines the regulatory changes that will come with being a registered provider under the new Act. I think particularly helpful is on page 10 a summary table which outlines existing obligations of CHSP providers and how those obligations will look, whether they’ll be new, the same, slightly different when the new Act starts on the 1st of November. So really commend that to you. We’ll also post the link for that booklet in the chat for anyone who wants to access it and read it. 

In the next month or so we’ll also be releasing an interactive online tool that will help CHSP providers and all aged care providers understand the requirements that apply to them from the Act and the Rules in one place. You’ll be able to jump on to navigate the finder using filters and search criteria to produce a list of all the obligations that are relevant to your individual organisation and download that output for later use. You’ll also be able to use the tool if you’re thinking about changing your service delivery and you want to have a think about how would that change your obligations. And this tool will also have built into it pop up links that will reference you to the Act and the Rules if you want to have a look at the information on the original source. 

And look finally from me a quick update on deeming which is the process of translating all current aged care providers and CHSP providers to the status of registered provider when the new Act starts. I know we’ve been talking about that as something that would happen on the 1st of July but that’s connected to the commencement of the new Act and so that deeming process will now happen on the 1st of November. 

The provider registration preview which we used to inform the deeming process did close on the 1st of June and I really want to thank you all for the great participation. We had a high rate of engagement in the preview and we appreciated the time that you took during a busy period generally to review the information about your deemed status, your proposed registration status. Even though the preview period has closed it’s really important that between now and 1 November all aged care providers stay in touch with us about any changes to your organisation that might occur so that when we do that deeming on the 1st of November we do that as accurately as possible. 

For those of you who already have access to GPMS – so that will be those of you that also offer Home Care Packages or residential aged care – you can use GPMS and the ‘Manage your Information’ tile on GPMS to update your details. New users, your GPMS access is coming. That will probably be first available on the 1st of November but between now and then we’ll be sending information to the organisation administrator who’s been nominated in your organisation about how to get access to the GPMS, what it means to set that GPMS account up. And once again really important. If between now and hearing from us there’s a change in your organisation administrator really important that you reach out and share that with us. And the contact details for that are gpms.project@health.gov.au and we’ll make sure we reach out. 

And finally a quick couple of links on this page to a range of resources that we’ve got available about the new Regulatory Model and also our resources index. And there you can see links to things like all our videos about the new Reg Model if you want to catch up on content we’ve shared in previous webinars. 

I will pause at that point. Apologies it’s been a little bit of a rapid fire update but hopefully those resources are really useful to you and I commend them to you if you haven’t seen them already. I’ll now hand over to Christian Hesse from the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. Over to you Christian. 

Christian Hesse: 

[Visual of slide with text saying ‘Australian Government with Crest (logo)’, ‘Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission’, ‘CHSP sector readiness webinar’, ‘Presenter: Christian Hesse, Acting Executive Director, Quality Assessment and Monitoring Group’, ‘Date: 12 June 2025’] 

Brilliant. Thanks Rob and thanks all for allowing me to join today. My name’s Christian Hesse and I’m the Acting Executive Director from the Quality Assessment and Monitoring Group at the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. And I really appreciate the opportunity to come along today and share some information about the Commission’s regulatory approach. 

So in the next slide you’ll see from the 1st of November the Commission will regulate the CHSP program underneath the new Aged Care Act. The Commission will also regulate the new Support at Home Program which replaces the Home Care Packages Program and Short Term Restorative Care Program. Under the new Regulatory Model we’ll monitor CHSP and Support at Home providers to make sure they’re meeting their obligations and delivering care that is high quality and safe. And our regulatory functions will monitor the compliance of providers in this program and will include safeguarding older people by supervising provider performance at all times, and this includes analysing intelligence we get from serious incidents, complaints, audits and risk-based monitoring activities. We’ll register providers underneath the new provider registration system including auditing Support at Home providers in categories four and five against the strengthened Quality Standards. We’ll look to build sector capability and promote continuous improvement through sector education and engagement activities. And I’ll summarise what we’ve already done a little bit later on. 

And finally our complaints function. We expect our complaints function will be a primary means through which we identify requirements that Support at Home providers might be struggling with and we’ll be listening to what people receiving care and their families are telling us about their experience of Support at Home and take action where appropriate. 

So the registration model. Underneath the new Aged Care Regulatory Model all Government funded aged care services need to be registered by the Commission and this is different from current processes where only some providers are approved by the Commission. Providers will apply to be registered into one or more of the six registration categories. To stay registered they’ll need to meet their obligations and conditions of registration based on their category. When making registration decisions we’ll test the provider’s suitability, capacity and capability. And the registration will be for a set period, usually three years. 

The Commission can change the registration of a provider because of risks to older people and registered providers can also request to vary, revoke or suspend their registration. And when registration is set to expire we’ll invite providers to renew their registration and this will restart the registration cycle. 

All current providers will be deemed as registered providers from the start of the new Act on the 1st of November and Rob’s spoken a little bit about that process a few moments ago. 

Now I’d just like to touch on the strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards. Complying with the strengthened Quality Standards is a condition of registration for providers in categories four, five and six. The strengthened Quality Standards will replace the current Standards at the start of the new Aged Care Act on the 1st of November and the strengthened Quality Standards is one of the key recommendations from the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety and it has five key focus areas. Dementia care, governance, food and nutrition, diversity and clinical care. And they’re an integral part of a rights-based approach to the new Act where the rights of the older people are embedded throughout the Standards. And very importantly the Quality Standards give providers a way of reviewing and understanding their own performance and where they need to improve. 

Under the new model demonstrating conformance with the strengthened Quality Standards is a key part of the registration renewal process for those providers as I mentioned in categories four, five and six and the Standards that will apply will not be the same for all providers and it will depend on your registration category. Conformance with the Standards is assessed through audit and the results of that audit will help us make a registration decision. Under the new system audits against the Quality Standards will only be carried out as part of the registration process and this will take place in one of three moments or circumstances. If an organisation or a person is applying to be registered in categories four, five or six for the first time, that’s a registration audit. A registered provider is applying to renew their registration in categories four, five and six, we call that a renewal audit. And if a registered provider is applying to vary their registration to add categories four, five or six for the first time to the registration, that’s a variation audit. And audits are predictive. They help us to understand if the provider can meet the relevant Quality Standards before being granted registration. 

In terms of the audit process itself on the screen you can see a bit of a sample of what that might look like for a provider. The key I guess themes or stages. There’s three key stages. Stage one is audit initiation and that occurs when the audit program and activities will be communicated to the provider. So you’ll have a single point of contact throughout the audit process from start to finish. We’ll arrange meetings with the provider and the board and senior managers and information about the provider level systems and processes will be requested. So we request that information once and we utilise it at all subsequent audits so we’re not asking you for the same thing again and again and again. 

Stage two is the audit delivery and it’s really broken into two parts. It’s that provider level evidence collection and the second part is the audit activities to validate the provider systems and processes. And we do that once at each category six residential care location and one audit across a sample of category four, five locations as well. 

And then comes the third stage. Each audit will result in a preliminary audit report and providers will have an opportunity to respond, usually 14 days to respond to that audit report, and then you’ll receive a final audit report which considers the preliminary audit report as well as the provider’s response. And all the audit reports will inform that final registration decision for the provider and the length of registration period that’s provided by the Commission. 

In terms of supervision of the sector the Commission’s introduced a new approach called provider supervision and we monitor all providers to identify if there may be risks or failures and we do that by analysing mandatory reporting, complaints, reports of serious incidents, our audits and our other regulatory actions. And all providers are allocated a supervision status and you can see the supervision statuses listed there across your screen and they go from a risk surveillance up to active and targeted surveillance. 

So in terms of from our perspective and more generally the key benefits of the supervisory model, we get a complete picture of the sector and we understand comparatively how everyone’s performing. We have improved insight and analysis. We have sector wide risk ratings. We have more efficient internal resourcing in terms of undertaking regulatory activity where it’s needed. And we have provider specific approaches. So it’s not a cookie cutter approach for every provider. It’s based on the specific circumstances of that particular provider, the challenges that they may have in the sector and what are the issues that we’ve identified. 

So really importantly in terms of how you can prepare from the 1st of November – and that’s one of the key questions that we’ve been asked – there’s a whole bunch of information that’s available on both the Commission’s and the Department’s website. I’ve got some listed here as specific examples. And I might just skip to the next slide as well. We have a sector readiness plan which we’ve recently released. This has a list of all of the guidance material that we’ve produced to date that you can click on a link and go to straight away as well as a plan of what we’re expecting to release between now to 1 November and then past that date as well. That particular sector readiness plan will be continually updated so please bookmark it and check it back regularly to see what new things that we’ve added to that particular plan. 

And also if you’re struggling or you’re not quite sure about what components of the strengthened Quality Standards might be suitable or required for your particular provider if you scan this QR code it will take you through to a tailored online module where you can actually put in the details of your provider, what kind of services and things like that that you deliver, and it will actually then take you straight to which of the Standards and obligations and things like that that apply. So I highly recommend you jump on and check that out. 

And that’s all for me today. Thanks very much for the opportunity to chat to you today.  

Claudia Dukats: 

Thank you Christian. We now move to the Q&A session. So firstly we will answer the five most frequently asked questions that were submitted pre-webinar. We will then move to your questions and answer as many as we can in the time that we have. Please be assured if we don’t get to the questions we will respond and post them on our website.  

So the first question I’m going to hand over to Marty to answer. So this probably has two parts to it.  

Q: The changes to CHSP reporting in DEX, are they effective from 1 July or are they delayed to 1 November? 

Martin Dempsey: 

1 July. Not delayed. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Q: Do we need to collect MAC IDs from 1 July or from 1 November? 

Martin Dempsey: 

Collect MAC IDs from 1 July on own client management system, reporting through DEX from January. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Great. 

Q: When is the functionality of DEX going to be available? 

Martin Dempsey: 

There’s two aspects already that are out there. Everything to do with stage one is the mapping which needs to be in place by 1 July to be able to report against the Service Agreements. The second one is to do with the My Aged Care new field in terms of that reporting. That will be available for providers to be able to do a sandpit trial area from October this year prior to it needing to be reported from January. 

The third stage – because it did come up in one of the questions. Just to answer. Third stage is about things like distance of trips and those type of things. That will be available in terms of a sandpit from January to June, starting to be reporting from July 2026. Three stages. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thank you. Nicholle. 

Q: Why must CHSP clients be assessed for eligibility from 1 July when the new Act doesn’t start until November? 

Nicholle Zervos: 

Thanks Claudia. Well as providers know they shouldn’t be providing any services to clients that are not assessed and registered with My Aged Care. That’s an obligation under their current Agreement and that won’t change once 1 November comes into play. We’ve heard from you that there are issues with getting assessments, hence we’re really pushing you to ensure that you can get your clients that you are providing services with and that haven’t had their assessment yet apply for an assessment as soon as possible. Because the assessment times do vary across Australia. They’re not all consistent. So it’s really important that they get in as soon as possible.  

Claudia Dukats: 

Thanks Nicholle. Christian this one’s for you. 

Q: Is the Statement of Rights starting from 1 July and do they need to be signed by clients like the Charter of Aged Care Rights? 

Christian Hesse: 

Thanks Claudia. Great question. When the new Aged Care Act commences from 1 November CHSP providers will be required to provide and assist their clients to understand information about their rights including the Statement of Rights. However there’s no requirement to have these signed. You can get further information from the Commission’s website as well. Thank you. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thanks. Rob. 

Q: How will dual provider registration applications occur if the provider wants to offer Support at Home as well as CHSP? 

Rob Day: 

Thanks Claudia. If you’re an organisation that’s already offering Home Care Packages and CHSP the deeming process will do that for you. It will create a single registration for your organisation that covers both programs and the services that go with each of those. If you’re only doing CHSP now and you want to expand after the 1st of November you’ll be able to apply to the Quality and Safety Commission to vary your registration to add the relevant registration categories that will let you be a Support at Home provider and you’ll then also need to go through the process of setting up your outlets, your My Aged Care system, your GPMS system so that you can accept referrals as a Support at Home provider. I think the critical thing you need to be aware of is in making that change as a Support at Home provider you’ll need to be able to meet the full range of services that your care recipients need including at a minimum the care management functionality. So have a think about that in terms of the scope of service you need to deliver. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thanks Rob. Nicholle this one’s for you taken off the screen. 

Q: We cannot provide services to assess clients if they cannot get assessments. So what are you planning to do to allow us to deliver services within wait times well past three weeks? 

Nicholle Zervos: 

Again all I could say is maybe this deferral has been a little bit of a blessing with the Act starting a bit later. We just implore you to help your clients apply for their assessments. While they’re waiting for their assessment there’s no reason why they can’t continue the services because we understand they are still needing to wait for that. But it really is important that they have applied for an assessment and are in that process. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thanks Nicholle. Marty. 

Q: Why is there no extra funding for CHSP when there is significant increased compliance and administrative and reporting work to be done? 

Martin Dempsey: 

So we have indexed by 2.3% the current Agreements and also we’re trying to work with providers to understand the costs of service delivery. That’s an ongoing conversation that we will continue to do over the 25-26 year. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thank you. Nicholle another one for you. 

Q: What will happen to grandfathered clients who are still waiting for their assessment from 1 July? Will they be able to receive funded services? Can we report them on DEX? 

Nicholle Zervos: 

Yes. As we know the new Act won’t come in until 1 November, so again you really need to be encouraging your grandfathered clients to apply for an assessment to ensure that they can continue to receive their services once 1 November ticks over. Unfortunately if they are adamant that they won’t be getting an assessment they will have to pay full fees for their services. But we will also be sending out some notifications to providers, some fact sheets to support them with the transition of clients and we’ll be doing that very shortly following this webinar. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thanks. We have another one. 

Q: How will subcontractors become associated providers under the new Act. What will be their responsibilities under the new Regulatory Model? 

Robert Day: 

That’s probably one for me Claudia. And so associated providers will be identified to the Commission in some situations by the registered provider. So there will be certain types of associated providers that need to be reported. But there won’t be a register of associated providers anywhere. So they won’t be deemed. It just is a legal acknowledgment of that subcontracting relationship. I think the most important thing that you need to understand is as a registered provider you are responsible for the quality of care that is delivered even if you use an associated provider to deliver that, and the workers of that associated provider are considered to be your workers for the purposes of the Aged Care Act. So as the registered provider you’re accountable and you then need to use your contracting arrangements with that associated provider to make sure that they’re doing the job in the appropriate way and that you’ve got the visibility of how they’re doing their work to be confident that your obligations are being met. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thank you. I think the last one to Marty and then we’ll do a wrap up. 

Q: Do we still need to report against the 17 program activities in DEX from 1 July or from 1 November? 

Martin Dempsey: 

So the 17 service types would be mapped to the new service list. If you’ve got those services in your Agreement you’ll be able to report underneath them from 1 July, not from 1 November. It starts from 1 July. 

Claudia Dukats: 

Thanks Marty. Just to finish up we encourage you to stay up to date with issues affecting aged care and subscribe to our Aged Care Newsletters and mailing list. Please scan the QR code that you’ve seen on the screen and we can supply in a moment.  

When the webinar finishes a short survey will pop up on your browser. It takes about a minute to answer four short questions. We would appreciate it if you could take a moment to help us improve our webinars. 

This concludes our presentation today. Please note that a recording of this webinar will be available in the following days. Thank you. 

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