10371 – Individual submission

A lot of people with disabilities who are currently an NDIS participant receiving a NDIS package are going through a lot of battles with getting a plan that works for them and reflects their goals, passions, interests and aspirations. There is a lack of communication and people with disabilities do not know where things are at or if any further information is required as the regions do not contact participants to provide an update and let them know how the progress is going and a simple update to inform participants where they are currently at. NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators say they will contact you and advise participants they will be contacted when they have spoken to the relevant people/relevant personnel and participants do not receive a phone call within a reasonable timeframe as the NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators do not stick to their promise to contact participants. All the pre-planning information participants provide before their planning meeting is not transferred across to their upcoming NDIS plan, there is nothing mentioned from the NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators stating the information has been read, nothing from NDIA Planners and Local Area Coordinators to state the information provided has been actioned and that NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators are aware and understand what each participant has been battling and what their goals, needs and requirements are. So many people are facing and battling planning difficulties due to plans not being correct and items that have been asked for are not funded, NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators not realising the time and energy participants put in to provide all the information ahead of time to the NDIA, that participants are spending more time at the AAT fighting for their rights as their rights are not upheld and NDIA planners and Local Area Coordinators do not understand what it feels like when you have spent a long time to come to a resolution at the AAT for something you were previously funded for, then providing the information to the NDIA with the outcome, the NDIA then say they didn’t receive the AAT documents and have to provide the outcome from the AAT again to the NDIA to upload on your file and then find that when your next plan is due that the NDIA does not take into account your agreement with the AAT and receive a plan that does not include what you have already got approval of from the AAT and then have to go through the review process again and back to the AAT again seeking more legal advice for the same thing and have to spend more months coming to another resolution and supplying more documents to the NDIA that the AAT has overturned the original decision. Participants should only have to go to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal once to get a decision over turned if NDIA say no they will not fund it not send participants to the AAT year, after, year, after year, after year for the same matter that has already been agreed to. Participants do not plan to go to the AAT and do not have the time and energy to be spending at the AAT participants have other things that they would like to be doing however because the NDIA refuse to fund what participants ask for participants have no choice other than to go to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. It is not the participants sending the NDIA to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal it is the NDIA sending participants to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. Something needs to be written that says “participants only need to take their matter to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal once and if the AAT overturns the original decision that the NDIA made the participant provides documentation stating the agreement that has been made under section 42C this will be uploaded on to the participants file and funded in both current, subsequent and future plans participants will not have to go back to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal again for the same matter to get a new agreement only if it is a new matter that has not already been taken to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal”.
This will save participants having to continue to seek legal advice/legal assistance. The NDIS was not designed and aimed for participants to be fighting for their rights and going to seek legal advice to identify legal issues the NDIS was designed to give people with disabilities greater voice, choice, control and flexibility.