Your NDIS Budget Buys Fewer Hours Than It Used To. Here's the Work-Around.
If it feels like your plan doesn't stretch as far as it did last year, you're not imagining it. The maths genuinely changed in 2025–26, and it changed in exactly the areas a lot of us rely on most: support work, cleaning, and home and yard maintenance.
Here's what happened, and a legitimate way to claw some of those hours back.
Why your hours shrank
Every July the NDIA updates its price limits: the maximum a provider is allowed to charge per hour for each type of support. For 2025–26:
Disability support work went up about 3.95%. The standard weekday cap now sits a bit over $70 an hour, and up to $127.43 an hour on a Sunday.
Cleaning and home/yard maintenance went up about 3.2%. Cleaning is now capped at $58.03 an hour and gardening (home and yard maintenance) at $56.98 an hour.
Now here's the part nobody explains clearly: your plan budget is a fixed pool of dollars, not a fixed number of hours. When the hourly cap goes up but your dollar budget doesn't grow to match, the same money buys fewer hours. A rate rise that looks like good news for workers quietly becomes fewer visits for you.
So if your support worker, cleaner or gardener charges at or near the cap, you're paying more per hour than last year for the exact same help, and running out sooner.
The work-around: independent sole traders who charge under the cap
The price limit is a ceiling, not a fixed price. The move is to find independent sole traders who charge well under it, around $50 an hour:
Cleaning (house cleaning and household tasks): find a cleaner charging $50 an hour.
Gardening (house and yard maintenance): $50 an hour.
Support work: find a support worker charging a flat $50 an hour, and only $50 regardless of the day or time, instead of the cap that climbs from $70.23 on weekdays to $127.43 on a Sunday.
Plenty of independent workers, sole traders with an ABN, will happily work for $40–$50 an hour. There are a surprising number of people who can clean, garden or support you without needing a specific qualification to do it, and a lot of cleaners, gardeners and support workers don't have formal qualifications anyway. Some do, plenty don't, and all they really need is an ABN. That's well under the cap, and the difference goes straight back into your budget as more hours. If your gardener charges $45 instead of the $56.98 ceiling, you're not saving money to hoard. You're buying more visits with the money you already have.
This isn't a loophole or a grey area. It's the choice-and-control the scheme is supposed to give you, used properly.
Important: this only works if you're self-managed or plan-managed
Before you go looking, check how your plan is managed, because this is the part that trips people up:
Self-managed: you can hire any worker at any rate, registered or not. Full freedom. This work-around is built for you.
Plan-managed: you can also use unregistered sole traders. The only catch is your plan manager won't pay above the price cap, which is irrelevant here, because $40–$50 is well under it. You're fine.
Agency-managed (NDIA-managed): you cannot use unregistered sole traders. You're limited to NDIS-registered providers only. If this is you, the only way to open up the cheaper independent market is to ask for your next plan to be plan-managed or self-managed. Talk to your planner or support coordinator at your next review.
A quick reality check before you spend
Cleaning and yard maintenance are only claimable if they're actually funded in your plan because of your disability. They're not an automatic entitlement. Check your plan first. If it's funded, you're good. If it's not, paying for it out of NDIS money can land you with a debt to repay.
What they actually need
Just one thing: an ABN. Without it, they can't invoice you or your plan manager. That's the only hard requirement.
Everything else is your call, not a rule. Insurance and an NDIS Worker Screening Check are not required for an unregistered sole trader working with a self- or plan-managed participant. You can ask for them if you want the extra peace of mind, but for a cleaner, gardener or support worker you know and trust, most people don't bother. Find someone reliable with an ABN, agree on the rate and hours up front, and you're set.
Where to find them
Mable: a platform that connects you with independent workers and handles the admin for a fee. Easiest starting point, though the fee eats a little of the saving.
Direct: if you already know someone reliable who'd do the work, you can set them up as a sole trader and engage them directly.
The bottom line
The rate rises weren't the scandal here. The scandal is that nobody topped up your budget to match. You can't change the caps, but you can choose who you hire and what they charge. Find independent workers charging under the ceiling, and the same plan suddenly covers a lot more of your week.
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