NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits (PAPL)

What is the NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits (PAPL)?

The NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits (PAPL) is the NDIA's rulebook for pricing and claiming NDIS supports, long known as "the NDIS price guide". It lists the maximum price for each support item and sets out the claiming rules, such as cancellations, provider travel and non-face-to-face work. From 24 September 2026 the maximum prices are set by the Minister's pricing determination and published as the NDIS pricing schedule 2026–27, while the 2025–26 PAPL remains the latest published version of the claiming rules.

So when someone searches for the "current NDIS price guide" in late 2026, the honest answer has two parts:

• Prices come from the NDIS pricing schedule 2026–27, incorporated in the National Disability Insurance Scheme (Pricing Arrangements) Determination 2026 (F2026L01268 on the Federal Register of Legislation).
• Claiming rules still come from the NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits 2025–26, which stays on the NDIA's pricing arrangements page until the NDIA publishes the updated pricing and claiming guidance it has said is coming.

Everyone in the NDIS touches the PAPL. Providers use it to set prices and claim correctly, plan managers check invoices against it, support coordinators use it to cost options, and participants use it to see what their funding can buy. Before it was renamed, the document was simply called the NDIS Price Guide, which is why that name is still what most people type into Google.

How NDIS pricing arrangements work in 2026–27

For most of the scheme's life, the NDIA set price limits itself through an Annual Pricing Review and published a new PAPL each 1 July, with mid-year updates when needed. That changed in 2026. Amendments made through the Securing the NDIS for Future Generations legislation let the Minister for Disability and the NDIS make a pricing determination by legislative instrument, with the NDIA advising on prices. The first determination was registered on 23 September 2026 and incorporates the pricing schedule under section 45C of the NDIS Act 2013. The NDIA's announcement, New price limits set for NDIS supports, says providers and participants don't need to do anything differently because of the change in decision maker.

What the 2026–27 pricing schedule contains

The schedule is mostly price tables. It has four parts:

1. Part 1: how the maximum amounts work, including differences by complexity and intensity, location, day and time, and group supports.
2. Part 2: the price tables, in seven appendices.
3. Part 3: the isolated towns that are reclassified as remote or very remote for pricing.
4. Part 4: definitions, including time of day, day of week and the list of public holidays.

Two structural changes stand out. First, there are no longer state and territory price columns: each item has a national, remote and very remote maximum, chosen by the Modified Monash Model category of the place the support is delivered. Second, claim types that used to be rules attached to a therapy item (cancellation, non-face-to-face, provider travel, NDIA-requested reports and telehealth) now have their own support item numbers with a suffix: _CA, _NF, _PT, _RR and _TH. Specialist disability accommodation has its own separate SDA pricing schedule, also effective 24 September 2026.

What the 2025–26 PAPL still covers

The claiming rules that the schedule doesn't repeat are still read from the 2025–26 PAPL: short notice cancellations, provider travel caps, non-face-to-face supports, claiming for group supports, irregular SIL and the rule against extra fees. The NDIA lists the 2025–26 PAPL next to the schedule on its pricing page. Treat its prices as superseded and its rules as current guidance until replaced.

What the pricing documents cover (and who they apply to)

The NDIA's pricing arrangements page now holds a small family of documents. Knowing which one answers which question saves a lot of searching.

The price limits apply to supports paid from NDIA-managed and plan-managed funding. For NDIA-managed funding the provider must be registered; for plan-managed funding the limits apply whether the provider is registered or not. Participants who self-manage are not bound by the price limits or the pricing arrangements, although many providers and participants use them as the benchmark anyway.

A few rules apply across every table:

• Limits are maximums. You agree a price with each participant, up to the limit, and record it in the service agreement.
• GST is included. The schedule says every maximum amount already includes any GST.
• Units matter. Limits are per unit of measure: usually an hour, but sometimes each, day, week, month or year.
• Group supports are divided. For a support delivered to a group at the same time, the per-participant claim is the item's limit divided by the number of people in the group.
• Crossing a time band. When one worker's support runs across two time-of-day bands, the higher limit applies to the whole support.
• No extra fees. Registered providers can't add surcharges, gap fees or late payment fees that the pricing arrangements don't allow (see the NDIA's note on travel claiming rules, gap fees and other costs).

To look up an item and its current maximums, use the free NDIS price guide search, which is built from the 2026–27 schedule. No dollar figures appear on this page because they change; always read the limit from the schedule for the date the support was delivered.

What participants and families should know

If you're a participant, the price guide matters to you in three ways. It tells you the most a provider can charge your NDIA-managed or plan-managed funding for each support, so you can check quotes and invoices. It explains what else can be charged, such as travel time or a short notice cancellation, and only if you agreed to it in your service agreement first. And because higher prices use up a budget faster, it helps you and your support coordinator work out how far your funding will stretch across a plan.

A provider can charge you less than the limit, and it's reasonable to ask how they set their price. If you self-manage, providers can agree a price with you that's above the limit, so read the agreement carefully and compare it with the schedule before you sign.

PAPL vs pricing schedule, support catalogue and price limit

These names are used loosely, even by people who work with them daily. The short version: the pricing schedule sets the prices, the PAPL explains the rules, the support catalogue is the spreadsheet you load into your billing system. A price limit is the single maximum for one item, unit and location.

How to use the NDIS price guide to price and claim a support

Whatever the document is called, providers use it the same way. The NDIA's own order of operations, adapted to the 2026–27 schedule:

The free NDIS travel calculator and cancellation calculator apply the 2025–26 PAPL rules to 2026–27 prices, and the service agreement generator writes those rules into an agreement the participant can read.

What's changing next

Prices and rules move every year, and sometimes mid-year. As of October 2026, the NDIA and the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing have flagged:

• SCHADS Award changes. The Fair Work Commission's decision on Schedule E of the SCHADS Award takes effect on 1 December 2026, and the Department has said the 2026–27 pricing schedule will be updated later this year to reflect any required changes.
• New claiming guidance. The NDIA says it will publish updated pricing and claiming guidance documents. Until it does, the 2025–26 PAPL rules are the latest version.
• Differentiated pricing. The government has consulted on prices that differ depending on whether a support is delivered by a registered or unregistered provider. No start date has been confirmed.
• The next annual review. Consultation on 2027–28 prices is listed on the NDIA's annual pricing review page.

Each time a new schedule lands, compare the items you use, update your price list from the effective date (keeping old prices for supports delivered before it), and re-check every service agreement that quotes a price above the new limit.

Common mistakes with the NDIS price guide

• Quoting last year's document. Prices in the 2025–26 PAPL were replaced on 24 September 2026. Only its claiming rules are still in use.
• Looking for a state column. The 2026–27 schedule has none. Use national, remote or very remote by MMM category and the isolated towns list.
• Treating the limit as the price. It's a ceiling. The agreed price in the service agreement is what you claim.
• Claiming therapy travel or cancellations on the direct-service item. In 2026–27 these have their own suffixed items.
• Applying the limits to self-managed participants. They're not bound by them, though the agreement still has to be fair and clear.
• Charging a "gap" above the limit. For NDIA-managed and plan-managed supports, the participant can't be asked to pay the difference.