Preparing for Your First NDIS Planning Meeting

What the meeting is for

The planning meeting is where the NDIA works out what your plan will fund. It is a conversation about function: what you can do, what you need help with, what that help looks like on an ordinary day, and what you are trying to achieve.

It is not a test and it is not an interrogation, but it is the meeting that sets your budget for the life of the plan. Turning up with a clear picture of a real week is worth more than any amount of confidence on the day.

Write down a week before you go

This is the single highest-value thing on the list. Take seven days and note what actually happens: who helps with showering and dressing, how long it takes, who cooks, who drives, what happens overnight, what gets skipped when everyone is tired.

The reason is that people systematically understate their own support needs in meetings. A parent who has done the same routine for fifteen years does not experience it as support, they experience it as Tuesday. Written down, it is two hours a day of assistance, and that is the number the plan needs to reflect.

Include the bad weeks, not just the average one. A plan built on your best fortnight will not survive your worst.

Gather the evidence that carries weight

Reports from allied health professionals who have assessed function: occupational therapy, speech pathology, physiotherapy, psychology. A functional capacity assessment where you have one. Letters from a GP or specialist that describe impact rather than diagnosis, because the NDIS funds the impact.

Old reports are weaker than recent ones. A report that says what you cannot do without help is stronger than one that lists conditions. If you have a choice of what to bring, bring the specific over the impressive.

Decide your goals before someone else words them

Goals shape which supports can be funded, so they are worth writing yourself rather than accepting a suggested phrasing. Keep them plain and connected to real life: to travel to my day program on my own, to cook three meals a week without help, to move out of the family home within two years.

Two or three specific goals beat a long list of vague ones. And a goal that names an intended change gives the planner something to fund a support against, which a goal like 'to be more independent' does not.

The practical checklist for the day

Bring: your written week, your reports, your goals, a list of current providers, any quotes for equipment, and something to write on. Bring a second person if you can, not to speak for you but to take notes while you talk, because you cannot do both well.

Ask for the meeting format you need. A phone meeting, a longer session, an interpreter, an Easy Read version of documents, or a break partway through are all reasonable requests and are made in advance rather than on the day.

Say plainly where informal support is not sustainable. If a parent in their seventies is doing the overnight support, that is a fact the plan should account for, and it will not be accounted for if nobody says it out loud. Our article on NDIS housing options is worth reading first if a move out of the family home is anywhere in view.

Questions to ask before you leave the room

When will I receive the plan, and how? How many funding periods will it have and how long is each? Which of my supports are stated and which are flexible? Will I have plan management, support coordination, or both? What happens if my circumstances change during the plan? Who do I contact if something is wrong with the plan when it arrives?

Write the answers down in the meeting. Six months later, nobody remembers what was said, and the plan document does not record the conversation around it.

If you are unsure whether you need a plan manager, a support coordinator or both, our comparison of plan management options covers what each does before you have to choose.

After the meeting

Read the plan properly when it arrives, against your notes. Check that the supports you discussed are actually in it, that the goals are worded as you intended, and that the budget categories match the conversation. Errors happen and they are far easier to raise in the first weeks than in month nine.

If something important is missing or wrong, you can ask for a review of the decision. Time limits apply, so raise it promptly rather than waiting to see how the plan goes. Decisions rest with the NDIA throughout, and a request supported by evidence has a better prospect than one supported by disappointment.