Where support determinations come from
Support determinations are a new power created by the National Disability Insurance Scheme Amendment (Securing the NDIS for Future Generations) Act 2026. Before this, funding in your plan was only set through decisions about your own plan. A support determination lets the Minister change the funding for a whole type of support, across many plans at once.
They are disallowable instruments. That means Parliament can scrutinise them and vote to reject them within a set period after they are made.
The first support determinations: 1 October 2026
On 1 October 2026 the Minister made two instruments. The first sets out the funding reset and lists the supports it does not touch. The second creates a new plan variation pathway for people who need 24 hour disability support.
When the reset is applied to your plan, the funding available is reduced by:
- 50% for social, economic and community participation supports (previously called social, civic and community participation)
- 10% for improved daily living skills supports (previously called capacity building daily activities)
When it reaches your plan
Nothing changed overnight. You keep using your current plan and supports until your plan is created, reassessed or renewed between 1 October 2026 and 30 September 2027.
- From 1 October 2026: new plans, and scheduled or unscheduled reassessments. The NDIA contacts you 2 to 3 months before a scheduled reassessment
- From 1 February 2027: plan renewals too. The NDIA contacts you 60 days before a renewal, and you do not need to send any extra information
- By 30 September 2027: everyone with these supports will have had their plan renewed. If your reassessment date is on or after 1 October 2027, it is brought forward
What is protected
Only the two categories above are affected. The rest of your plan is not, including help in your home (eating, drinking, dressing, toileting, laundry, cleaning, community nursing and medication), home and vehicle modifications, personal mobility equipment and transport, continence and menstrual consumables, and Specialist Disability Accommodation.
Some supports inside the two affected categories are also left out of the reset, because they are essential to health, safety and wellbeing:
- Supports in employment
- Disability related health supports
- High intensity supports
- Intensive and complex behaviour supports
- Customised and wearable technology
- Hearing services
How it works in dollars
The cut applies to your budget, not to what you spend. The government's own example: someone with $50,000 a year for community participation who only uses $30,000 ends up with $25,000 available, so their real spending drops by $5,000, not $25,000.
Protected supports are taken out first. In another government example, a participant has $73,000 for community participation, of which $46,000 is for employment supports. Only the other $27,000 is halved, to $13,500, leaving $59,500 available in total.
Your new plan shows both your total funding and the funding available after the change, and it marks the funding that is not affected. You still choose how to use what is available, within the NDIS Pricing Arrangements.
Can you challenge it?
You cannot ask for a review of the funding reset itself, and the reduction on its own does not count as a significant and ongoing change for a reassessment or variation.
You can still ask for a plan variation or an unscheduled reassessment if your support needs have changed in a significant and ongoing way, for example because your living arrangements, education, work or the help you get from family has changed. The NDIA has 90 days to decide whether you are eligible for an unscheduled reassessment. If you are in a crisis or have experienced fraud, contact the NDIA about a variation.
If you need 24 hour disability support, the separate high support needs variation pathway lets you ask for enough funding to keep those supports safe.
Support determinations and new framework plans
Participants start moving to new framework planning from 1 April 2027. The 2026 funding reset only applies to plans made under the current arrangements, so once you move to a new framework plan it no longer applies to you.
What it means for providers
Providers of community participation, group programs and daily living skills supports should expect some clients to have smaller budgets after their next plan change. Talk with clients early about which supports matter most, check service agreements against the plan's available funding rather than the total, and remember the protected subgroups, such as supports in employment, are not reduced.