Now that you’ve planned out your supports, mapped how you would like to utilise your funds and decided on a service provider, such as Evolve Therapy Services, you’ll now need to review and sign a service agreement!
A service agreement covers the relationship you have with your service provider and how they will deliver this support. It’s a little bit like a contract between you and your provider and makes sure that you, but more importantly your provider, abides to the rules.
Putting together a service agreement should be a collaborative process. By working with your service provider, you can ensure that your service agreements accurately reflect the supports that you want and need.
What does it contain?
Number one, your service agreement should be simple – that is, simple to read and review, and simple for you to fill out and action. It should contain the following elements:
- Details about how, when and where services will be provided.
- How long and how frequent this support will be (how many hours of funding you wish to allocate to this service).
- Your responsibilities and your provider’s responsibilities.
- Any cancellation policies that the Service Provider has.
- What rights you have with respect to complaints and grievances.
- How the agreement will be reviewed.
- How you can change or end the agreement at any time.
Some tips and advice
- Meet with your ndis therapy or service provider face-to-face to discuss what you’d like the agreement to include. If that’s not possible, a phone chat is a good alternative.
- Spend some time talking with your service provider so you can make sure that they can provide you with the supports you want or need and so you can be sure they are clear about what your goals are.
- If your plan includes support coordination, ask them how they can help you put together your service agreements.
- If you wish, you can attach a copy of your NDIS plan to the service agreement. This can help ensure the service provider supplies the supports that align with your goals.
- Read the service agreement carefully before you sign it and keep a copy of the agreement so you can refer to it when you need.
