Aged Care Quality Bulletin #3-2026

Commissioner’s message

The first quarter of the year has flown by and it’s hard to believe how quickly we’ve moved from fresh beginnings under the new Aged Care Act 2024 (Aged Care Act) to meaningful progress. As we move into the months of shorter days and cooler weather, we’re also heading into the peak time for respiratory infections. That’s why this issue’s clinical update is about getting ready for respiratory season.

Another common and serious risk in residential aged care is malnutrition. We monitor how well providers are identifying and responding to malnutrition risk. We will support providers who need to improve and acknowledge those who are achieving excellence. Read the full article to learn more about our monitoring activities.

This week we opened registrations for the National Aged Care Provider Conference 2026. This years’ event will be held event at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre on Tuesday 13 and Wednesday 14 October 2026. I encourage you to look at the preliminary program setting out how we will explore ‘Rights and choice, every day: one year in’.

In April the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (department) is introducing pricing risk assessments. The new assessments are to help make sure providers’ aged care pricing reflects the real cost of providing care. Read on to find out what this means, and what to do if the department selects you for an assessment.

Meanwhile, reporting changes in operational beds is now easier. Residential aged care providers can record changes directly into the Government Provider Management System. You can record beds as offline or online – just follow the department’s step-by-step guide to learn how.

I’d also like to remind providers that it’s your responsibility to make sure your workforce is trained and supported to meet the requirements under the Aged Care Act. You can access online education and training resources on our Alis platform. We regularly update it with new resources. If you need a refresher on why it’s important to manage incidents effectively, you can watch our newly published presentation on incident management under the new Act.

Please also take some opportunities to have your say:

The department wants to hear about your experience of putting the new aged care reforms into practice. You can let them know how you’re going and where you need more support.
The Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority (IHACPA) is asking for feedback on in-home aged care pricing. Your input will help them develop the 2027–28 pricing framework and their pricing advice to government.

Liz Hefren-Webb
Aged Care Quality and Safety Commissioner

Aged care reform update

Registrations now open - National Aged Care Provider Conference 2026

Registrations are now open for the National Aged Care Provider Conference 2026 on Tuesday 13 and Wednesday 14 October 2026 at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre.

This key national event is aimed at responsible persons of registered aged care providers – including board members, CEOs or senior managers. In-person registration is capped at 2 representatives per registered provider.

The conference program includes a rich mix of plenary and parallel sessions as we explore ‘Rights and choice, every day: one year in’

Together, we’ll discuss what has changed in practice under the new rights-based Aged Care Act and Aged Care Rules 2025 and share insights and learnings into how we continue to embed and regulate rights-based aged care across all settings.

Select providers are being offered the opportunity to participate in a limited number of pre-conference pilot workshops held on Monday 12 October 2026 on risk for small providers and on culturally safe care for large providers.

Find out more on the National Aged Care Provider Conference 2026 page.

Changes to reporting offline beds

Residential aged care providers can now report changes to operational beds in the Government Provider Management System (GPMS).

Operational beds are included in the approved number of beds for your home. They can be occupied (used by people receiving funded aged care) or offline (not being used, for example because of renovations).

Registered providers must let the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (department) know when operational beds are offline (not available for use) for:

a period of at least 3 months for homes in Modified Monash (MM) 1–5 regions
any time for homes in MM 6 and 7 regions.

How to record bed changes in GPMS

From 23 March 2026, you can record beds as offline or bring them back online in GPMS using the ‘Manage Your Organisation’ tile. This sends the information to the department.

If you have beds that won’t be operational for 2 years or more, you must vary your registration to change the number of approved beds.

If you have difficulty using the GPMS, you can contact the department’s local network to help you with offline bed reporting.

You can find more information in:

Targeted review on the new Investment Standard

In April 2026, we will start a targeted review on the new Investment Standard.

All non-government providers registered in Category 6 must comply with the Investment Standard. This includes setting up and maintaining an Investment Management Strategy, which makes sure providers can provide safe, quality services and protect refundable deposits.

Targeted reviews focus on a specific issue, or a particular group of providers. They also allow us to educate and support providers. If we find that a provider isn’t complying with their obligations, we work with the provider to fix the issues.

Through this targeted review, we want to find out how well providers understand and comply with their financial and prudential obligations as required in the Investment Standard under the new Aged Care Act.

We may choose you for this review if:

you hold refundable accommodation deposits and have invested them
you’re at risk of not meeting your financial and prudential obligations or haven’t in the past
your organisation is in a particular location or of a particular size or type that we want to engage with
we think the review would benefit you.

After we complete a review, we produce an insights report to share our findings, including common mistakes and issues for providers to consider.

We will contact selected providers in April 2026.

You can find more information on Targeted Reviews on our website.

Keeping responsible persons details up to date

A new Responsible person details update form is now available on our website.

You can use it to update details of responsible persons in your organisation, such as role and contact information.

Keeping these details up to date makes sure we have accurate information about who is responsible for providing safe, quality care.

Only responsible persons listed in the Government Provider Management System (GPMS) can complete the form. You can find more information on Responsible person changes on our website.

For adding or removing a responsible person, or changes to suitability, continue to use a Change in circumstances notification form.

New pricing risk assessments for residential aged care

The Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (department) is introducing pricing risk assessments, starting from Quarter 4 (April to June 2026).

These assessments will help the department measure the impact of misreporting by residential aged care providers. They make sure pricing decisions reflect the cost of providing care.

Pricing risk assessments are not a compliance activity. They make sure the department understands and funds the sector accurately.

The department will review reporting from a sample of residential aged care providers and focus on key items in their Aged Care Financial Report.

What to provide if you’re selected

If the department selects you for an assessment, you need to provide the information they ask for, such as payroll records and rosters.

The assessments’ findings will help the department develop more accurate funding policy. They’ll also give the Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority reliable data so they can set prices that are based on evidence.

Find out more about pricing risk assessments for residential aged care.

Auditor guidance for Care Minutes Performance Statement

All residential aged care providers must submit audited Care Minutes Performance Statements for the Aged Care Financial Report 2025–26. This is due on 31 October 2026.

You can find auditor guidance and audit report templates on the Department of Health, Disability and Aged Care’s website to help you with this process.

Care Minutes Performance Statements are important in making sure registered providers accurately report care time to aged care residents.

To complete your Care Minutes Performance Statement as a provider, we encourage you to:

work with an external auditor early
maintain your records.

If you report a different number of care minutes in your Care Minutes Performance Statement than in the Quarterly Financial Report, the department can recalculate your care minutes supplement.

You can find more information about care minutes reporting requirements and how to prepare your statement in the department’s Care Minutes Performance Statement guide.

Education resources on incident management

Did you know we recently published a recorded presentation on incident management?

This short presentation provides an overview of the incident management requirements outlined in the Aged Care Act and the Aged Care Rules. It will help you understand your responsibilities and why it’s important to manage incidents effectively.

You can view this presentation through Alis.

Training staff on incident management

We’ve also created an education pack on incident management for aged care services to deliver to their own staff. You can deliver it all together or as a series of shorter sessions. You can focus on the sections that are most relevant to your setting or the time you have available.

The education pack includes:

an introduction to incident management
an overview of open disclosure
an introduction to incident management systems
information about the parts of an effective incident management system
scenario-based activities
an overview of incident management and the Serious Incident Response Scheme.

You can find this and other education packs on our Resources for educators and trainers page.

Food and nutrition

Monitoring malnutrition: From detection to prevention

To protect and safeguard older people receiving aged care, we collect, analyse and evaluate information from the aged care sector. This helps us to make sure providers and workers are meeting their obligations and understand current and emerging risks to older people. We collect this information from:

audits and other monitoring and compliance activities we do
provider reporting, such as the National Aged Care Quality Indicator Program
complaints received
notifications made through the Serious Incident Reporting Scheme.

Under the strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards providers need to identify, monitor and manage the risk of harm to the people they care for.

Malnutrition is an ongoing, common risk in residential aged care. It’s a serious issue that has significant effects on the health, wellbeing and quality of life of older people.

Therefore, an area of focus for our monitoring activities is how well residential aged care providers (registered in Category 6) are identifying, monitoring and responding to malnutrition risk. This includes checking that they’re:

regularly screening older people for malnutrition risk using validated tools
always monitoring the risk of malnutrition
responding when malnutrition risk is identified, including management strategies.

To protect older people and support providers to deliver quality care, we’ll contact providers to ask how they’re identifying, preventing and managing the risk of malnutrition. We’ll assess each provider’s risk controls and support them to improve if they need to. We’ll also acknowledge excellence in care. In response to risk identified, we are fair and balanced.

If you have any questions about our monitoring activities, or enquiries, concerns or complaints about food, nutrition and dining in aged care, you can call our Food, Nutrition and Dining Hotline on 1800 844 044.

Clinical update

Preparing for the respiratory season

As we get closer to peak season for respiratory infections, we remind providers of their responsibilities for making sure older people and workers have timely access to recommended vaccines. These include influenza, COVID-19, pneumococcal and shingles, following the National Immunisation Program.

State and territory health departments also fund other vaccines recommended for older people, such as the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine. It’s important to work with your immunisation provider and check the immunisation schedule in your area.

Infection prevention and control

Infection prevention and control (IPC) leads can support vaccination programs and make sure their service:

assesses all new residents to find out what vaccinations they need
includes vaccination planning in routine clinical care
keeps accurate records of people’s vaccination status, the vaccines they’ve consented to have, and those they are exempt from having (don’t have to have)
uses strong IPC practices
promotes the benefits of vaccines for older people and workers.

What you can do to prepare

You can start getting ready for vaccination programs in your services by following these tips.

If you’re a service or clinical manager, apply for access to the Australian Immunisation Register to:
track and monitor who’s due or overdue for a vaccination
make sure a person’s vaccination status reporting is correct
keep accurate supporting records.
Make sure you plan your approach to vaccination. This includes working with immunisation providers (GPs, aged care onsite pharmacists and community pharmacists or accredited immunisers) to:
plan and book vaccination clinics at the service
make sure older people have regular and timely access to vaccines
arrange discussions about vaccination and consent
make sure all older people have support and safe access to vaccines.
Get support and more information by contacting your immunisation provider, primary health network and state or territory health department.

Resources

National Immunisation Program schedule

NIP 2026 Influenza Vaccination Advice for Health Professionals

ATAGI Clinical Advice on Seasonal Influenza Vaccines in 2026

The Australian Immunisation Handbook

Australian Immunisation Register

Primary Health Network contacts

Webinars

Risk-based monitoring and inspections

Our next monthly sector webinar will focus on risk-based monitoring and inspections, on Tuesday 21 April 2026, 2.00 pm – 3.00 pm AEST.

Registrations will open via our website on 7 April 2026.

Recording available – Varying and renewing provider registration; your questions answered

This webinar was held on 17 March 2026. The recording and presentation slides are available on our website.

Get involved

Help shape in-home aged care pricing - public consultation now open

The Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority (IHACPA) invites you to have your say on in-home aged care pricing. Public consultation is now open.

Your feedback will help make sure IHACPA’s pricing advice to the Australian Government:

meets the needs of the in-home aged care sector
reflects the cost of delivering care.

Who can take part?

IHACPA welcomes feedback from across the sector, including:

in-home providers and workers
peak bodies, government departments and agencies
older people receiving in-home care, and their families
carers and representatives
members of the public.

Have your say on a range of topics

This year, the consultation covers many key areas of the Support at Home service list. It includes questions about:

improving cost data collections
exploring cost pressures providers are experiencing.

IHACPA will use the feedback to develop:

the Pricing Framework for Australian Support at Home Aged Care Services 2027–28
their pricing advice to government.

You can read the consultation paper, provide feedback and find other resources on IHACPA’s Engagement Hub.

The consultation is open until 5 pm AEST Friday 10 April 2026.

Survey on applying aged care reforms now open

The Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (department) wants your feedback.

The Aged Care Reform Sector Pulse Survey is an opportunity for aged care providers, workers and assessors to share:

your experience with the recent changes to aged care
your progress in applying the changes
how the department can best support you
your areas of concern or where you need more advice.

The survey takes around 15 minutes to complete and is open until Monday 20 April 2026. All responses are confidential.

Join our panels to have your say

Are you interested in taking part in consultations, workshops and other opportunities to give your feedback?

Provider and workers engagement register

The Provider and workers engagement register is a way for providers and workers to share their expertise and experience to help improve aged care.

You can take part as a provider representative, aged care staff member, or both.

As a member of the engagement register, you can:

share your views
help shape processes and resources
contribute to improving how we regulate aged care.

If you would like to join this panel, you can register online.

For more information about how to get involved visit our Consultation and Engagement Hub or email engagement@agedcarequality.gov.au.

Consumers and Families Panel

The Consumers and Families Panel help improve aged care through feedback. Members include people who currently use, or are thinking about using, aged care services, family members and supporters.

As a panel member, you can:

share what matters to you
provide feedback on aged care projects, resources and services
help improve how we regulate aged care.

Panel members can take part in different ways, including by email, over the phone, or in meetings (online or in person). If you want to join the panel, you can register online or complete a form.

Training and resources

Online live learning

Places are available for our upcoming live learning sessions in April. Each month, we deliver live learning for people working in the aged care sector. These sessions offer practical tips to support learners to understand how to meet their obligations in their service. Commission facilitators deliver our live learning sessions.

Our workshop topic for April is the strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards.

Places are limited, so head to our Live learning page to learn more or register today.