How to Switch NDIS Software Without Wrecking a Pay Run

The short version

Switching NDIS software is mostly a planning job, not a tech job. The providers who get burnt are the ones who flip over mid pay period, a week before an audit, or the week the price year changes.

• Ask the hard questions before you sign, especially about getting your data out again.
• Decide what has to move and what stays archived in the old system.
• Pick a cutover date at the start of a pay period, away from 1 July, award changes and audits.
• Run both systems side by side for at least one full pay and billing cycle.
• Treat it as a privacy event. You're moving health information about people with disability, and the Privacy Act applies.
• Don't cancel the old system until you have every record you're legally required to keep.

This is general information, not legal or financial advice.

Signs it's time to switch

The usual signals:

• Your admins re-key the same thing twice. Shifts typed into the roster, then into payroll, then into an invoice spreadsheet.
• Pay runs need a fix-up day. Penalty rates, broken shifts or sleepovers get corrected by hand every fortnight.
• Invoices bounce. Wrong support item, wrong price year, or a plan manager kicks them back.
• Audit prep means digging. Incident registers, worker screening expiry dates and signed agreements live in five places.
• You've outgrown it. You've added SIL houses, therapists or a second region and the system doesn't fit.
• Support is slow or offshore, and nobody understands NDIS claiming when you ring.

ShiftCare's own switching guide is a fair list of what goes wrong: operational disruption, data migration risk, training time, cost, integration issues, compliance and security, and staff resistance to change (ShiftCare, How to transition to a new care management software). Plan for every one of them.

What to ask vendors before you sign

Every vendor demos well. Get the boring answers in writing.

Contracts: unfair terms are illegal

If your business has fewer than 100 employees or under $10 million in annual turnover, you're likely protected by the unfair contract terms law for standard form contracts. Since 9 November 2023, businesses can't propose, use or rely on unfair terms in those contracts. The ACCC's examples of terms that may be unfair include ones that let only one side end the contract, change its terms, or avoid its responsibilities (ACCC, Contracts; ACCC media release). Read the software agreement for exactly those clauses, and ask a lawyer if one looks one-sided.

What data moves, and what usually doesn't

Not everything is worth migrating. Some data moves cleanly as rows; some is better kept as a PDF archive. Agree the list with the new vendor before you set a date.

Worker screening is worth extra care this year. Clearances last up to 5 years, so the earliest ones issued from February 2021 started expiring from February 2026 (NDIS Commission, Worker screening).

Clean before you move: merge duplicate participants, archive people who left years ago, and fix each participant's support items.

Pick your cutover date

There's no standard timeline; the vendor's setup and migration answer sets most of it. What you control is the cutover date, and three calendars decide it.

Pay cycles

Cut over on the first day of a pay period, so no fortnight is split across two systems. Then look at how much slack you have: the Fair Work Ombudsman says pay slips have to be given within 1 working day of pay day (FWO, Pay slips). The first pay run on the new system has no room for "we'll sort it out next week".

The price year and award changes

NDIS prices change on 1 July. Each support item in the NDIA's catalogue carries start and end dates, and you claim the item and price that applied on the day the support was delivered, so June shifts invoiced in July still need June's prices (NDIS Support Catalogue 2026-27). Our 2026-27 pricing guide covers what changed this year.

Award rates move too. SCHADS minimum rates changed from the first full pay period on or after 1 July 2026 (FWO pay guide, 1 July 2026), and the interim increase for home care disability employees (Schedule E) starts on 1 December 2026, with more due on 1 October 2027 (FWC, [2026] FWCFB 232; FWC Determination PR814259). Don't make your first pay run in a new system the one with new rates in it. See the SCHADS pay rates guide.

Audit dates

If you're registered, don't cut over in the weeks before an audit. Auditors sample real records, and you want them coming from one system you know well, not half from each. Aim for the quiet months after an audit. The audit preparation guide has the full timeline.

A shape that works

One way to plan it, in order:

Run both systems in parallel

Do the same period in both systems and compare before you trust the new one. It's double work for a short time, and the cheapest insurance you'll buy.

What to compare at the end of the period:

• Timesheets and pay. Same worker, same shifts: do the hours, penalty rates, allowances and sleepovers match?
• Invoices. Same participant, same shifts: same support items, same prices, same totals?
• Budgets. Does each participant's remaining funding match what you'd expect?
• Exports. Does the claim file or accounting sync produce what your plan managers, the NDIA portal or your bookkeeper expect?

Keep the parallel run to admins. Support workers stay on the old app while an admin replicates their shifts in the new system.

When the numbers match for a full cycle, cut over. If they don't, find out which system is wrong. Sometimes it's the old one.

Training and the app rollout

Train admins first, then team leaders, then support workers. The people who answer questions need the answers before anyone asks.

For the support worker app:

• Pick a go-live week, not a go-live day. Send logins in batches so your phone doesn't melt.
• Give each worker a one page sheet: log in, find today's shift, clock on and off, write the note.
• Have someone on call for the first shifts, especially early mornings and sleepovers.
• Retire the old app on a set date and tell everyone. Two live apps means notes in the wrong place.

A new app is also a good moment to reset what a good progress note looks like. The progress notes guide has examples.

Privacy when you move personal and health information

The Privacy Act almost certainly applies to you

The small business exemption doesn't help most NDIS providers. The OAIC says an organisation that provides a health service and holds health information is covered by the Privacy Act "even if they're a small business", and lists "a disability service provider (where they handle health information)" as an example (OAIC, What is a health service provider). Health information is "any personal information about your health or disability" (OAIC, What is health information). Separately, the NDIS Code of Conduct requires every provider, registered or not, to "respect the privacy of people with disability" (NDIS Commission, Code of Conduct).

The Australian Privacy Principles that bite during a switch

All of these are in the OAIC's text of the APPs (OAIC, Read the Australian Privacy Principles).

• APP 1: your privacy policy. It must say whether you're likely to disclose personal information overseas and, if practical, to which countries. If the new vendor stores or supports data offshore, update the policy.
• APP 6: use for the original purpose. Moving participant records into a new system to keep delivering their supports is the same purpose. Using the migration to start marketing, or sharing the data with a third party, is not.
• APP 8: overseas recipients. If information goes to someone overseas, you must take reasonable steps to make sure they don't breach the APPs. The OAIC says sending data to an overseas cloud provider purely for storage may count as a "use" rather than a disclosure, but only if a binding contract limits them to storage, binds their subcontractors, and leaves you in effective control of the data (OAIC, APP 8 guidelines, paragraph 8.14). Ask the vendor for exactly that.
• APP 11: security and destruction. You must protect the information from misuse, loss and unauthorised access, and destroy or de-identify it once you no longer need it, unless a law requires you to keep it. The OAIC says data a vendor stores for you is still data you "hold", and destruction covers "copies that have been archived or are held as back-ups" (OAIC, APP 11 guidelines, paragraphs 11.6, 11.39 and 11.41).
• APP 12: access. Participants and workers can ask for their information. You still need to find it after the switch.

Practical steps

• Move data through the vendor's secure upload, not email attachments.
• Limit who handles migration spreadsheets, and delete the working copies once you're live.
• Turn off old system logins nobody needs.
• Get written confirmation of what the old vendor deletes, and when, once your retention periods allow it.

If a spreadsheet goes to the wrong person, the Notifiable Data Breaches scheme may apply. You must take all reasonable steps to assess a suspected eligible data breach within 30 calendar days, and notify affected people and the OAIC if it's likely to result in serious harm (OAIC, Notifiable Data Breach scheme).

Keep the old records

Switching doesn't shorten how long you must keep records. Export what these rules need before you cancel:

Fair Work also says time and wages records must be "readily accessible to a Fair Work Inspector" (FWO, Record-keeping). A login to a system you stopped paying for isn't. Get a full export, check it opens, and store it securely somewhere you control.

The switching checklist

Before you sign

• Pricing model, plan inclusions and price rise terms in writing
• Where data is hosted, including backups and support, confirmed in writing
• Claiming, accounting and payroll integrations confirmed against how you work today
• Migration scope agreed: what moves, from which files, who does it, what it costs
• Contract read for minimum term, auto renewal, one-sided termination and exit terms
• Data export on exit: formats, cost and how long you have
• Old contract's notice period and end date found

Before cutover

• Privacy policy updated if overseas disclosure changes
• Old data cleaned: duplicates merged, support items fixed
• Participants, budgets and staff documents checked after import
• Every worker screening clearance and expiry date re-checked
• Cutover date on the first day of a pay period, clear of 1 July, award changes and audits
• Admins trained, support worker go-live week planned
• Parallel run complete with pay, invoices and budgets matching

After cutover

• Old app retired on a set date
• Full export of the old system archived, opened and stored securely
• Old logins switched off
• Migration spreadsheets deleted from laptops and drives
• Old subscription ended, and deletion confirmed in writing when retention periods allow

If you're moving to Orangised, you don't start with an empty login: we set up your portal and walk your team through it, so you can run the checklist above against a system that's ready to go.