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Social work practice chart of accounts

Social work is one of the ATO's listed health services, so a social work session performed by a recognised professional as appropriate treatment is GST free whoever pays the invoice. The rest of the week is not. A social work chart of accounts pairs a taxable account with every GST free one under each NDIS management type, and codes reports, training and groups apart.

Key facts

Where social work sits
Last on the ATO's closed list of health services, so an hour performed by a recognised professional as appropriate treatment of the person receiving it is GST free. Who pays the invoice is not one of the three conditions1
What the list does not cover
A support the NDIS funds that is not itself a listed health service. That is where capacity building, community access groups and daily living work sit, and the template codes them taxable until the four requirements are confirmed5
The template to start from
NDIS provider, plan managed. It is the only canonical template that opens a non listed revenue account beside the listed one under each of the three NDIS management types5
The paired accounts
Six revenue accounts in three pairs, one pair per management type, plus a second pair for group programs. The pair is what lets one participant carry two tax rates in one fortnight5
Who counts as recognised
A person registered, permitted or approved under state or territory law to provide the listed health service, or where there is no such law, a member of a professional association with the same registration requirements nationally1
What appropriate treatment means
Using professional skills to assess a person's health, work out a course of action to preserve, restore or improve their wellbeing as far as the practitioner's training allows, and supply a treatment the profession generally accepts as appropriate for them4
The four NDIS requirements
A plan in effect, the support specified in the statement of supports, a written agreement, and a supply covered by one of the two tables in the NDIS Determination2
Who the recipient is
Whoever engages the health practitioner. In many cases that is the patient, in some cases it is a business, and supplies of services by a health practitioner to another business are not usually GST free3
Reports and assessments
Account 420 in the template, at the GST on Income rate. The reason the template gives is that a report written for a support coordinator's employer or another external party is taxable5
Training and workshops
Account 421 in the template, at the GST on Income rate, because the template treats training and capacity building workshops as taxable by default even where NDIS funding pays for them5

Three questions decide the account on a social work line

Most health charts of accounts are built on the payer, because for a single service practice the payer is the only thing that varies. A social work practice varies on more than one axis at once, and the payer is the axis that leaves the tax rate alone. So the chart has to be built to answer three questions at the moment a line is coded, not at the end of the quarter.

  1. Who performed the hour, and are they recognised in the listed service.
  2. What the support was, and is it itself a listed health service or something the NDIS funds alongside one.
  3. Who the work was for, which is not always the person in the room.

The funder still matters, because it decides who owes the money and how long it takes to arrive. It just does not decide the rate. That is the reversal a social work practice has to make, and it is easier to make once in the account list than every fortnight in a bookkeeper's head.

Social work is on the list, which settles the session

The GST Act carries a closed list of health services that are GST free when the other two conditions hold, and social work is on it. That puts a social work practice in a better position than a counselling or exercise physiology practice, whose first argument is about whether the service is listed at all. The session is settled. The difficulty moves one step out.

A recognised health professional is a person who is registered, permitted, or approved under state or territory law to provide the listed health service. If there is no relevant state or territory law, a recognised professional is a member of a professional association that: relates to the listed health service; has the same registration requirements nationally.1

That is the sentence a social work practice reads twice. Two routes are open, and which one applies is a fact about the practitioner and their association rather than about the practice. This page does not settle it for anybody: it says where the answer lands once the practice has it.

The first question is who performed the hour

A social work practice often runs mixed teams: qualified social workers, support workers, and staff whose qualification sits outside the listed services entirely. The same appointment type on the same day can be delivered by two of them. Only one of those hours reaches the GST free side, and nothing on the invoice says so unless the chart makes it say so.

  • The association route asks for membership of a body that relates to the listed service and applies the same registration requirements nationally, which is a question about the association as much as the member.
  • The AASW's own credential is open to members holding a recognised social work qualification, and asks for continuing professional development and evidence of professional supervision to keep it.
  • Counselling delivered by a social worker is a live question for the same reason, and is counselling GST free runs it in full. The counselling chart of accounts is the neighbour page for a practice whose team is mostly counsellors.

Practically, the practice writes the answer down once per practitioner and maps their calendar or their invoice items to the account that answer implies. That is a five minute job at setup and an unbounded one at BAS time.

The second question is what the support was

This is where a social work chart earns its keep. A social worker with an NDIS caseload bills therapy hours, and in the same fortnight bills capacity building, life skills work, community access, group programs and the odd workshop. The canonical NDIS provider template is the only one of the three that opens a taxable account beside the GST free one for exactly this, under each management type.

What a social work practice bills, and the account the NDIS provider template's chart carries for it5
What is on the lineWhich question decides itAccount in the template
A counselling hour with a participantWho performed it403 NDIS plan-managed, listed supports
Capacity building or daily living workWhat the support is404 NDIS plan-managed, non-listed supports
A community access group programWhat the support is425 Group programs, non-listed supports
A group run by the listed professionalWho performed it424 Group programs, listed supports
A report for a court, a school or an insurerWho the work is for420 Reports, assessments and progress notes for third parties
A workshop or training session the practice runsWhat the support is421 Training and capacity-building workshops

One line of that table is worth a second look. The template opens account 424 for a group run by the listed professional and spells out no revenue row that reaches it, so a group line resolves to the plan managed default account until the practice writes a row of its own. The account is in the chart; the rule that fills it is the practice's to add.

Nothing else in that table turns on who paid. Swap the plan managed participant for an agency managed one and the pair changes, with the same question deciding which half of the new pair the line lands in. The non listed NDIS supports page carries the four requirements a support has to meet before it moves to the other half.

The one row the three templates do not agree on

Worth knowing before a chart is copied from somewhere else. Resolve a plan managed non listed support through each canonical template and they do not answer the same way, because only the NDIS provider template carries a row for it. The other two fall back to their funding source default, which was written for a listed profession.

NDIS plan managed, Non-listed supportsA treatment card for a plan managed non listed support, showing that the three canonical templates differ: the NDIS provider template posts it to its own non listed account at the GST on Income rate, while the other two fall back to their funding source default at the GST free rate.NDIS plan managedNon-listed supportsallied-health-by-funding-source405 Clinical services, NDISplan-managedGST Free IncomeResolved by the funding source default row.See account 405.ndis-provider-plan-managed404 NDIS plan-managed, non-listedsupportsGST on IncomeThis template has its own row for this pair.A support NDIS funds that is not itself oneof the ATO's listed health services needsthe full four-part s38-38 test to beGST-free: an in-force plan, the supportnamed in the plan's statement of supports, awritten service agreement, and coverageunder the GST-free NDIS SupportsDetermination's tables. The ATO's own workedexample is exercise physiology delivered ina clinic to an NDIS participant, and it isnot GST-free, because thebehavioural-and-therapeutic-supports tableonly applies when the service is alsocovered by one of the other determinations,unless it is delivered in a residential carefacility. This is the single most common GSTerror the research found for NDIS providers,so the safe default for a non-listed supportis taxable, not GST-free(docs/research/domain-mechanics.md, section3.4).psychology-with-booking-deposits403 Clinical services, NDISplan-managedGST Free IncomeResolved by the funding source default row.See account 403.The canonical templates do not post this thesame way, so each template is shown as itposts it.
Plate 1The row a social work practice cannot afford to inherit from the wrong template, drawn as one posting per canonical template.

The template's own review checklist calls the non listed supports its central risk and asks a BAS agent to confirm, per support item, that a written agreement exists and that the support is covered by the Determination tables. That is a per item question, so the chart holds two accounts and the practice answers into them.

One participant, one fortnight, five rows

Standing map rulesFive rows of the standing map for one plan managed participant: the therapy session, a non listed support, a community access group, a workshop and a report, each resolving to its own revenue account, with the tax rate and the template's reason printed beside it.What was billedWhere it postsNDIS plan managed403 NDISplan-managed,listed supportsPractice defaultGST Free IncomeSee account 403. Funding-source default forplan-managed work.NDIS plan managed404 NDISplan-managed,non-listedsupportsNon-listed supportsGST on IncomeA support NDIS funds that is not itself oneof the ATO's listed health services needsthe full four-part s38-38 test to beGST-free: an in-force plan, the supportnamed in the plan's statement of supports, awritten service agreement, and coverageunder the GST-free NDIS SupportsDetermination's tables. The ATO's own workedexample is exercise physiology delivered ina clinic to an NDIS participant, and it isnot GST-free, because thebehavioural-and-therapeutic-supports tableonly applies when the service is alsocovered by one of the other determinations,unless it is delivered in a residential carefacility. This is the single most common GSTerror the research found for NDIS providers,so the safe default for a non-listed supportis taxable, not GST-free(docs/research/domain-mechanics.md, section3.4).NDIS plan managed425 Groupprograms,non-listedsupportsGroup programs, non-listedGST on IncomeA support NDIS funds that is not itself oneof the ATO's listed health services needsthe full four-part s38-38 test to beGST-free: an in-force plan, the supportnamed in the plan's statement of supports, awritten service agreement, and coverageunder the GST-free NDIS SupportsDetermination's tables. The ATO's own workedexample is exercise physiology delivered ina clinic to an NDIS participant, and it isnot GST-free, because thebehavioural-and-therapeutic-supports tableonly applies when the service is alsocovered by one of the other determinations,unless it is delivered in a residential carefacility. This is the single most common GSTerror the research found for NDIS providers,so the safe default for a non-listed supportis taxable, not GST-free(docs/research/domain-mechanics.md, section3.4).NDIS plan managed421 Training andcapacity-buildingworkshopsTrainingGST on IncomeTraining and capacity-building workshops aretaxable by default even when NDIS fundsthem. The same pattern applies toNDIS_AGENCY and NDIS_SELF(docs/research/domain-mechanics.md, section3.2 and 3.4).NDIS plan managed420 Reports,assessments andprogress notesfor third partiesReportsGST on IncomeA report to a support coordinator's employeror an external party is taxable; a reportthat is itself a named therapy support inthe plan is arguably GST-free. The samepattern applies to NDIS_AGENCY and NDIS_SELF(docs/research/domain-mechanics.md, section3.4).
Plate 2Five lines a single social work caseload can produce in a fortnight, resolved through the product's own cascade rather than read off the file by hand.

One funder, five accounts, two tax rates. The first row is the funding source default, and the four underneath it are category rows that outrank it. A bank rule or a sales account written against the funder alone sends all five the same way, which is how a quarter of taxable capacity building ends up sitting in a GST free account with nothing to flag it.

The third question is who the work was for

Social work generates more third party documents than most allied health. Court reports, school reports, insurer updates, letters for a housing application, notes for a support coordinator's employer. The ATO's position is that the recipient of the supply is whoever engages the practitioner, that it will sometimes be a business, and that supplies by a health practitioner to another business are not usually GST free.

  • A report the client asked for as part of their own treatment is a different thing from a report a third party commissioned, and reports and medico-legal work draws that line.
  • Training and workshops sit outside treatment of the person receiving care, so they keep their own account whoever funds them. Training and workshops has the detail.
  • Report writing inside an NDIS plan is left open by the template, which carries a confirm note rather than an answer on whether it is plan funded documentation or third party work.

An invoice to another provider is a different supply again

Plenty of social workers pick up hours through another provider rather than contracting with the participant. The invoice then goes to a business, not to the person in the room, and a provider guide puts the consequence plainly: subcontracted work invoiced to another provider is a business to business supply, so GST may apply. That is the same recipient test, arriving through a different door.

Setting the chart up in Xero

  1. Write down, once per practitioner, which route to recognition applies to them, and keep it with the practice's own records rather than in a bookkeeper's memory.
  2. Create the revenue accounts in pairs, with the tax rate set on each account, so a line coded to the wrong half is visible as a wrong account rather than as a wrong rate.
  3. Open the report, training, group and cancellation accounts at the same time, because the first one of each is needed before anybody thinks to ask for it.
  4. Create the settlement clearing accounts as bank type accounts, one per rail, each coded BAS excluded.
  5. Map each invoice item in the practice system to the account its support type implies, and check the written service agreement reference is captured against the client. The written agreement is the requirement providers most often miss.
  6. Take the pairs and the practitioner list to the practice's BAS agent before the first sync, and record what they said against each one.

What Ledger Map does with the chart

Ledger Map holds one standing map for the practice, approved before anything syncs. A social work line resolves through that map on the funding source and the service category together, so a capacity building hour and a therapy hour for the same participant reach different accounts without anybody remembering to intervene.

When the money lands, the batch is posted as one balanced document set against the rail it came in on, with the claim lines underneath it, and one exact match is left in the bank feed for the practice to accept. A line the map cannot resolve becomes a question with the options laid out. See how it works, or the rest of the library.

Questions

  • Is social work GST free?

    Social work is one of the listed health services, so the first of the ATO's three conditions is settled. The other two still have to hold: the hour is performed by a recognised professional in that listed service, and the profession generally accepts it as necessary for the appropriate treatment of the person receiving it. Who pays is not part of the test.

  • Which revenue accounts does a social work practice need in Xero?

    A GST free and a taxable account under each NDIS management type, a second pair for group programs, then the accounts that sit outside treatment: reports and assessments, training and workshops, cancellation claims, and other income. The canonical NDIS provider template ships all of them, and the pairs are what let one participant carry two rates.

  • Where does NDIS capacity building work post?

    To the non listed side of the pair for that management type, at the taxable rate, until the four requirements are confirmed for that support. The template treats non listed supports as its central risk and asks for a per item confirmation that a written agreement exists and the support is covered by the Determination tables.

  • Does a court or school report go in the clinical account?

    No. A report commissioned by a court, a school or an insurer goes in the reports and assessments account at the taxable rate. The recipient of the supply is whoever engaged the practitioner, so that report is supplied to them rather than to the client, which takes it outside the GST free clinical work.

  • Can tracking categories replace the paired accounts?

    Tracking categories answer a different question. Xero gives a practice two tracking category slots and most practices spend them on practitioner and location. The tax rate lives on the account and the activity statement is built from accounts and rates, so a split that has to reach the activity statement belongs in the account code.

Read next

Sources

Open questions

  • Whether a given social worker is a recognised health professional in the listed service turns on state or territory law where there is one, and otherwise on whether their professional association applies the same registration requirements nationally. That is a fact about the person and the association, and this page does not settle it for anyone.
  • Which of the two Determination tables a particular NDIS social work support falls in, and whether the other three requirements hold for it. The template codes non listed supports taxable by default and asks for a per item confirmation, and this page leaves it there.
  • Report writing funded inside an NDIS plan. All three canonical templates carry a confirm note rather than an answer on whether it is plan funded documentation or third party work.
  • Supervision billed to another practitioner. The two canonical templates that carry a supervision row code it taxable and flag it to a BAS agent as a grey area, and the NDIS provider template carries no row for it, so it stays a question here.
  • A subcontracted invoice to another provider. The ATO's recipient wording points at a business to business supply, and none of the canonical templates carries a revenue row for it, so the account is a practice decision.
  • No search result capture exists for this query, so the answer landscape behind this page is argued from its structure rather than measured, and the FAQ was written from the material rather than from People also ask. No practitioner account of setting this chart up was found, so the page carries no practitioner quote.
  1. GST and health: other health services

    Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 12 Jun 2024.

    primary

  2. GST and health: National Disability Insurance Scheme

    Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 13 Jun 2024.

    primary

  3. GST and health: recipient of the supply

    Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 12 Jun 2024.

    primary

  4. GST and health: appropriate treatment

    Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 12 Jun 2024.

    primary

  5. NDIS provider, plan managed, the canonical template

    Ledger Map. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026.

    primary

  6. NDIS GST exemption, a provider guide

    Novida. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026.

    secondary

  7. Accredited Social Worker

    Australian Association of Social Workers. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026.

    secondary

Review

Last reviewed 3 Sep 2026 by Shane

General information for Australian allied health practices, not tax advice. Confirm a treatment with your BAS agent or accountant before you post it.

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