NDIS software – Reduce admin and improve cash flow with API integration
By integrating NDIS software with the NDIA’s APIs, providers are experiencing fewer rejections, improving cash flow, and spending less time and money on admin.
Disability providers are estimated to be owed as much as $300 million in unpaid claims by the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) according to National Disability Services (NDS), the peak industry body for disability providers in Australia.
The move to a ‘payment in arrears’ funding model under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) in recent years has put increasing financial pressure on disability providers. It has resulted in higher administrative costs and increasing cash flow challenges as a result of late, incorrect or failed payments.
The timeliness of payments remains a real issue for providers, making it difficult to deliver a consistent care program with the uncertainty surrounding cash flow. Even worse is the impact this can have on the provision of services to participants.
Read on to see how Lumary supports providers to:
- Save time with automated admin processes
- Enable cleaner data and maintain compliance
- Reduce claim rejections for faster and more reliable payments from the NDIS
- Improve the employee experience
Greater access to the NDIS to streamline operations
Fortunately, the NDIA has recognised the role NDIS software providers can play in helping to alleviate the strain on providers and participants.
The NDIA is working with disability software developers, like Lumary, and registered providers to enable the interoperability of systems that automate transactions, streamline administration, and improve the experience of NDIS participants.
One of the ways they are doing this is by providing access to Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to allow connections between registered providers and some NDIA systems and data. These APIs are only available for registered providers and disability software vendors who work with registered providers.
Automating and accelerating service booking management
An example of one of these APIs in action is an integration that allows users to automatically make service bookings and service booking amendments in the NDIA’s myplace portal directly and seamlessly from their IT system.
Lumary has developed an NDIA Integration Module with the appropriate level of access and security for all customers that require integration with the NDIA to enable this automation.
By seamlessly connecting providers to the NDIS system and automating manual tasks, Lumary is enabling a fast, cost-effective, and streamlined service booking process to support the ongoing growth and evolution of the NDIS.
What does this mean for providers?
When using the NDIA Integration Module (the Module) within the Lumary platform – Lumary CM – service bookings will automatically be:
- created in the myplace portal when a new service booking is created on a service agreement in Lumary CM. Service bookings can be made at category level for open bookings, line item level for stated line items or using any combination allowed by the participant’s NDIA plan, and
- amended in the myplace portal when a service booking is amended on a service agreement.
The illustration below highlights the automated elements of the service booking process.
While working in Lumary CM, users can choose which service agreements automatically create service bookings with the NDIA with a few simple settings incorporated into the current service agreement creation process.
This flexible integration supports all types of Service Agreements for any NDIS registered service provider, so you’ll be able to utilise this module no matter what service type you provide.
One of the benefits of utilising a fully monitored and managed service is that our system is maintained and updated continually, so providers no longer need to worry about the ongoing NDIS changes to service bookings.
Additionally, it makes an audit conducted by the NDIA or a referred matter to the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission a transparently reportable and painless process.
More time for client engagement
By automating the service booking process, users will save a significant amount of time by removing the need to manually enter service booking data twice between a provider’s disability software and PRODA (Provider Digital Access). This gives staff back more time for new and existing client engagement.
As the service booking creation and amendment processes are automated, this reduces the time spent troubleshooting errors and increases downstream efficiency due to cleaner data. Ultimately, this will deliver faster provider payments and remittances and improved employee experiences.
With the automated process taking place in the single user interface of the Lumary CM platform, one Lumary customer has noted, “The efficiency it’s created is great, it makes it so much easier handling service bookings in one spot.” They have found that they can now dedicate fewer resources for processing.
Improve cash flow with faster and more reliable payments
But how does the Module address the challenges with late, incorrect or failed payments?
Lumary’s Module will validate participants created in Lumary CM against their record in the myplace portal, so providers are notified if a client isn’t covered under the NDIS. It also checks whether a participant’s plan has valid and sufficient funding attached.
The result is faster processing with automated plan creation and a reduced number of claim rejections (and the frustrating delays that follow), enabling providers to accelerate the speed of time to payment and strengthen cash flow management.
The future of NDIA automation
The move from the NDIA to open up access to some of their data and systems is a positive step for providers. They will now be able to reduce their administrative burden and improve the consistency and speed at which they receive payments for services delivered.
In particular, Lumary CM with the NDIA API Integration Module will allow providers to support employees to streamline operational tasks with real-time automation within an easy-to-use single user interface. Ultimately, this puts money and time back into the pockets of providers and allows them to focus on their primary job – caring.
With the NDIA continuing to develop its Digital Partnership Program, we can expect more opportunities for API integration to support providers with greater efficiencies in the future. The scalable nature of Lumary’s NDIA Integration Module means that it will support future NDIA feature enhancements and automation capabilities, which will only further reduce the administrative burden for providers.
Existing customers can commence their FREE no-obligation trial and experience the full benefits of the NDIA Integration Module by getting in touch with Lumary. For those interested in finding out more about Lumary’s care management software, contact our Sales team and discover the benefits today.