National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA)

What is the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA)?

The National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) is the Australian Government agency that runs the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). It decides who can join the scheme, builds and approves participants' plans, pays for supports and manages the scheme's finances. The NDIS is the scheme; the NDIA is the organisation that delivers it.

The NDIA is a corporate Commonwealth entity set up under the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013. It has a Board, which sets strategy and oversees performance, and a Chief Executive Officer (CEO). The NDIS Act gives most decision-making powers to the CEO, who delegates them to NDIA staff such as planners and delegates who make access and plan decisions. Since 2025 the NDIA has sat in the Health, Disability and Ageing portfolio.

You'll see the NDIA's name on access decision letters, plans, review decisions and payment remittances. In everyday speech people often say "the NDIS" when they mean the NDIA, for example "the NDIS approved my plan".

What the NDIA does

The NDIS Act sets out the NDIA's statutory functions. According to the NDIA's statutory functions page, they include delivering the NDIS so it supports the independence and social and economic participation of people with disability, managing and reporting on the scheme's financial sustainability, developing the disability sector, building community awareness, collecting and sharing data, and research.

In practice, that means the NDIA:

• Makes access decisions: whether a person meets the age, residence and disability or early intervention requirements after an access request.
• Builds and approves plans: works with each participant on their goals and decides which supports are reasonable and necessary.
• Reassesses and varies plans: through scheduled reassessments, requested reassessments when circumstances change, and minor plan variations.
• Pays for supports: processes payment requests from registered providers for NDIA-managed funding, and pays plan managers and self-managing participants.
• Sets pricing: publishes the NDIS pricing arrangements and price limits, the maximum prices most providers can charge.
• Publishes operational guidelines: the NDIA's "Our Guidelines" explain how it applies the law to decisions.
• Reviews its own decisions: an internal review of a reviewable decision is done by someone who was not involved in the original decision.
• Protects the scheme: monitors claims and acts on fraud and non-compliant claiming.

How the NDIA works with partners

The NDIA doesn't deliver everything through its own staff. It funds organisations, known as partners in the community, to work with participants locally:

• Local area coordinators (LACs) help people aged 9 to 64 understand and apply to the NDIS, prepare for planning, start using their plan and connect with community and mainstream services.
• Early childhood partners deliver the early childhood approach for children younger than 6 with developmental delay or younger than 9 with disability, and help families gather evidence for an access request.

Partners can help with planning conversations, but decisions about access and the supports in a plan are made by the NDIA. Participants usually manage their plan and claims through the NDIA's online portal and app (see my NDIS portal), and providers use the my NDIS provider portal. The NDIA's general enquiries line is 1800 800 110.

NDIA vs NDIS vs NDIS Commission

This is the comparison people search for most. The NDIS is the scheme. The NDIA runs the scheme. The NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission regulates the providers. The NDIA and the Commission are separate agencies with separate jobs, and the NDIA explains the split on its page about the role of the NDIS Commission.

The Commission explains its own role on What we do. Read more in the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission and NDIS entries.

How the NDIA makes decisions

NDIA decisions are legal decisions made under the NDIS Act and the NDIS rules. A delegate of the CEO must apply the law to the evidence in front of them, which is why the same diagnosis can lead to different outcomes for different people.

Three things shape most decisions:

1. The law. The NDIS Act, the NDIS rules (including the lists of NDIS supports) and any transitional rules set what the NDIA can and can't do.
2. Operational guidelines. The NDIA publishes Our Guidelines, which explain how it interprets the law, for example how it applies the reasonable and necessary criteria. Guidelines are not law, but decision makers follow them.
3. Evidence. Reports from treating professionals, functional assessments, and what the participant and their family say about daily life. Evidence that describes functional impact and support needs is usually more useful than a diagnosis alone.

If a decision letter doesn't make clear why a support was or wasn't funded, you can ask the NDIA to explain the decision before deciding whether to seek a review. Many NDIA processes, such as access decisions, also have timeframes set in the law, so it is worth noting the date you sent each request and keeping copies of what you sent.

Disagreeing with an NDIA decision

Many NDIA decisions, including access decisions and decisions about the supports in a plan, are reviewable. The process has two stages (NDIA: how to request a review of a decision):

A complaint about how the NDIA treated you, rather than the decision itself, can be made through the NDIA's feedback process. If that doesn't resolve it, the Commonwealth Ombudsman can look at complaints about the NDIA's administration.

Working with the NDIA as a provider

Providers deal with the NDIA mainly through pricing and payments, not registration. Things to get right:

• Claim only what's in the plan and agreed. Each claim must match a support in the participant's plan, the service agreement and what was actually delivered.
• Stay within price limits. The NDIA's pricing arrangements apply to NDIA-managed and plan-managed participants, whether or not you are registered. Check current limits in the free NDIS price guide.
• Use the right channel. NDIA-managed supports are claimed by registered providers through the provider portal as a payment request. Plan-managed supports are invoiced to the plan manager.
• Keep records. Under the 2026 amendments, providers must keep records relating to a claim, of a kind prescribed by the NDIS rules, for seven years from the day the claim is made. This applies to claims made from 27 August 2026 (NDIA: Securing the NDIS for future generations).
• Expect payment integrity checks. The NDIA can ask for evidence that supports were delivered and can recover amounts paid for claims that shouldn't have been made.

Recent changes affecting the NDIA's role

The NDIA's decisions now run under a changed legal framework. The 2024 amendments, which commenced on 3 October 2024, introduced section 10 lists of NDIS supports and the basis for new framework plans, which are built from a support needs assessment and a budget method set in the rules. The government has said new framework planning is expected to start gradually from 1 April 2027.

The NDIS Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Act 2026 received assent on 20 August 2026, with some changes starting on 27 August 2026, such as tighter criteria for unscheduled plan reassessments. New access rules using a standardised assessment of functional capacity are due to apply to new applicants from 1 January 2028. The NDIA's own guidelines are being updated as these laws start, so check the date on any guideline you rely on.

Common misunderstandings about the NDIA

• "The NDIA registers providers." No. Registration is done by the NDIS Commission. The NDIA sets prices and pays claims.
• "My LAC decided my plan." LACs help you prepare and use your plan, but the NDIA makes the decision.
• "Complaints about a provider go to the NDIA." Complaints about the quality or safety of supports go to the provider first and then the NDIS Commission. Payment or plan issues go to the NDIA.
• "The NDIA and the NDIS are different schemes." There's one scheme, the NDIS, and one agency running it, the NDIA.
• "Unregistered providers don't deal with the NDIA's rules." Price limits still apply to plan-managed participants, and claims still need to match the plan.