Guide
How Care Spend works
Care Spend turns a participant’s NDIS funding into a live forecast. The model is a chain: a participant has a plan, the plan is split into budgets, and each budget tracks two things — allocations (what you plan to spend) and expenses (what you actually spend). The forecast compares the two. Here’s each piece.
01
Participants
The person whose NDIS funding is being tracked. You record their name, NDIS number, and location — the location sets the right price column for support items.
02
Plans
A funding period for a participant: a start and end date and a total amount. Most participants have one active plan at a time.
03
Budgets
A plan’s total is split across categories — Core, Capacity Building, Capital. Each budget is a pool the participant spends from, tracked against its own total.
04
Allocations
A planned, recurring amount from a budget — for example, “$500 a week from Core, provider Joanna.” Allocations are the projection: they model how a budget is expected to be drawn down over the life of the plan.
05
Expenses
The actual spend recorded against a budget — real dated transactions, like a $480 support session. You enter them as they happen, or let an allocation post them automatically. Expenses are the “what really happened” half of the picture.
06
Forecast
Care Spend compares the projection (from allocations) against actual spend (from expenses) to show each plan’s pace — surfacing the budgets tracking over long before they get there, so you can act early.
A quick tour
Open a participant
Here’s a participant view in miniature. Click the plan row to expand it and see the funding break down by budget — the same shape you’ll see in the app.
How do I…
Common tasks
Add a participant
From Participants, choose “New participant,” enter their name, NDIS number, and location, and save. You can add their first plan straight after.
Set up a recurring allocation
Open a plan, pick a budget, and add an allocation: choose a support item from the NDIS catalogue, set the amount and frequency, and the forecast updates immediately.
Record an expense
Open a plan and add an expense against a budget with its date and amount — or link it to an allocation. Allocations can also post expenses automatically. Each one updates actual-versus-projected.
Read the forecast
The dashboard shows each plan’s projected position and flags the ones tracking ahead of pace, so the plans that need attention this week rise to the top.