Monthly statements can be a great tool to help you understand your NDIS plan funding better, how your funding is being spent, and if you are over or underspending. Get to know your monthly statements better with our top FIVE tips.
What are monthly statements?
Before we dive into the tips, it’s a good idea to understand what monthly statements are and why they are important. Each month, you will receive a monthly statement that gives you an up-to-date overview of your NDIS plan funding. Your monthly statements, also sometimes called ‘monthly budget report’, will include:
Total spending to date
Breakdown of your Core, Capital, and Capacity Building supports
Graphs that show your pattern of spending
List of your monthly invoices detailing the service date, invoice number, provider, category, and the total cost
Your monthly statements, which are released via email on the first day of each month, can be a great tool to help you keep your budgets on track and avoid any overspending or underspending.
How do I read them?
Your monthly statements show your overall funding summary, as well as a summary of your Core, Capital, and Capacity Building Supports.
The summary will show your budget, how much you have spent, how much is pending, and how much is remaining.
For example:
In the example of Core Funding below, you can see the spending of Assistance with daily life (01) and Assistance with social and community participation (04) are a little under budget, and Transport (02), and Consumables (03) are a little over budget. However, the total spending in Core Funding seen in 'Core Combined' remains under budget.
Most of your budgets should remain consistent throughout the year, with three exceptions - Consumables (03), Assistive Technology (05), and Home Modifications (06) – which are often used to make one or two key purchases during the plan.
Top FIVE Tips on Monthly Statements
Tip #1: Access your personal Client Portal for in-real-time
Each month you will receive a monthly statement via email, however, if you want to have in-real-time access to your budgets, you can login to your personal Client Portal. Your Client Portal will provide up-to-date information on your budgets, as well as past and pending invoices.
You can login to your Client Portal through the First2Care website by clicking on the Client Portal button on the homepage. If you don’t currently have access to your Client Portal, you can request access by visiting the First2Care website, selecting ‘Your Hub’, then selecting ‘Portal Access’. To access the portal, you just need to fill in your details and one of our friendly support team will contact you.
Tip #2: Your Core Funding is flexible
When you login to your Client Portal, you have two ways that you can view your Core funding – either as a combined total OR broken down into the Core Support categories. This is because your Core Funding is flexible. Which means that you can move funding between each of the four Core Supports funding categories – Assistance with daily life, Transport, Consumables, and Assistance with social and community participation.
To view your Core Supports budget as a combined total, click the button ‘Core Combined’. You can revert this back to the breakdown of your Core Supports by clicking the button again.
If you do want to move funding around, contact your First2Care Client Manager or our support team.
Tip #3: We do the math for you
On your monthly statement, sometimes you will notice that there are some funds pending. This means the funds are currently being processed. Even though the funding is processing, the amount has already been factored into the remaining total. Which means you won’t need to do any math to figure out how much funding you have left.
In the example below, the total budget ($60,460.40) minus what has been spent ($31,880.70) and what is pending ($6,897.72) equals $21,681.98, which is the remaining amount.
Tip #4: Bar graphs aren’t as scary as they may seem
Your monthly statement includes a bar graph of your monthly spend. On this bar graph, there are two lines – one green and one purple – that indicate your average spending rate and your average monthly budget.
The green and purple lines allow you to compare how much you’re spending with how much you could spend. In the example below, the participant is underspending based on how much funding they have in their Core budget and have room to increase by at least $500/month.
The graph helps to show you the average that you can spend each month based on how much funding is in your plan and how long your plan is expected to last.
Tip #5: Keep an eye on the timeline
Ideally your spending should sit as close to the timeline (the black line) as possible. The indicates that your budgets are on track, and you’re not over or underspending. If over or underspending does occur, your Client Manager can give you tools and strategies to get your spending back on track.
If you have any questions around your monthly statements, you can contact your Client Manager or our support team via 1300 322 273 or email support@first2care.com.au.
Read more about the benefits of working with an independent, professional Plan Manager. Alternatively, contact our friendly team on 1300 322 273 or support@first2care.com.au.