While the rise in grievances is partly owing to the growing number of participants, there are serious concerns about the planning phase

Disability groups say the increasing number of complaints about the national disability insurance scheme reflects a “planning process in crisis”.

The number of complaints about the NDIS made to the commonwealth ombudsman increased from 62 in 2015-16 to 429 last financial year, the ABC reported on Saturday morning.

The increase is partially being driven by the growing number of NDIS participants, experts say.

But it is also broadly in line with other indicators, which show mounting dissatisfaction as the NDIS moves from trial to transition.



Federal court rules NDIS must fully fund 'necessary' supports and services Read more

The level of participant satisfaction with the NDIS was 84% in the three months to July, its equal lowest on record, according to a quarterly report to the Council of Australian Governments (Coag).

The report also shows a significant number of complaints made directly to the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA), as opposed to the ombudsman, in the same quarter.

The agency received 1,669 complaints in the three months to July – roughly one-third the number of complaints it has received since it moved into the transition phase.

The director of Disabled People’s Organisations Australia, Therese Sands, said the increase in complaints was not surprising, given the rapid rise in the number of people joining the scheme.

But Sands said it also reflected the serious concerns about the NDIS’s planning phase, which determines the level of support each individual participant can receive.

She said support plans for participants were being rushed to meet rollout targets, making the process less thorough and considered than it ought to be.

The complaints were being fuelled by a shift to phone planning, she said, instead of face-to-face meetings with participants, and the tendency to take a “tick-a-box” approach to planning for complex care needs.

“We are consistently hearing concerns about the planning process and the quality of the planning process, and it’s not surprising that there’s more and more complaints around planning,” Sands told Guardian Australia.

“Many of these issues have been fed back consistently to the NDIA – we feed these issues back, and we do know that the agency has identified this as a key area, and they are making changes.”

The Autism Awareness Australia chief executive, Nicole Rogerson, expressed similar concerns about the planning phase.

Rogerson said the political push to roll the scheme out quickly was leading to rushed planning for participants.

She said she recently became aware of a 17-year-old with severe autism, whose entire care plan was developed on the basis of what his mother thought was simply an initial call.

The mother was expecting a face-to-face meeting to further discuss her son’s needs, and was shocked to receive his finished plan in the mail.

“The problem is many people with disabilities have complex needs, which can’t be discussed, planned and signed off on over the phone – which is what many planners are doing to speed up the process,” Rogerson told Guardian Australia.



“The planning process is in crisis, hence the increase in complaints. I would normally say ‘hey, that’s just a problem of implementation’ but the government’s inability to own the problem, let alone work to adequately resource the roll out needs calling out,” she said.

The NDIA said it was acting on all recommendations arising through the ombudsman complaints process.

Labor using NDIS and Medicare levy 'to play politics', disability groups say Read more

It said the number of NDIS participants had tripled in the past financial year, and that those who had complained to the ombudsman represented just 0.013% of all participants.

A spokeswoman said the agency recognised the need to adapt and improve quickly, and it was undertaking a review to improve the “quality of the participant and provider experience”.

“The NDIA will continue working with people with disability, their families and carers to resolve any issues during this unique period of transition and remains committed to getting the balance right between participant intake, plan quality and the sustainability of the scheme,” she said.

But Sands said the NDIA needed to build a more effective feedback process, so it could pick up on concerns early, and address them well before a complaint was made.



She said the agency had made some effort to get feedback, through workshops and surveys, but it needed to be done more systematically.

“It can’t just come from complaints after the fact,” she said.

“They need to be proactively building in mechanisms to get feedback at the grassroots level. It needs to be more systemically embedded in the agency’s practices.”

