Is NDIS exempt from GST?

There is no blanket exemption for NDIS money. A listed health service is GST free under s38-10 whoever pays, so most therapy delivered under a plan is GST free on that basis alone. Any other support is GST free only where the four s38-38 requirements are all satisfied: a plan in effect, the support named in the plan's statement of supports, a written agreement, and coverage by the determination.

Does the management type change the answer?

Not for the tax test. The ATO says supplies of NDIS supports are made to the participant rather than to the plan manager, so agency managed, plan managed and self managed work all face the same two questions. What changes is who pays the practice and how the deposit lands, which is what the three funder pages cover.

Does the NDIS price guide include GST?

Where GST applies to a support, its price limit is inclusive of GST, so a taxable support billed at the limit collects less net revenue than a GST free one billed at the same limit. The Ledger Map page on NDIS price limits and GST works that difference through.

Do NDIS subcontractors charge GST?

The ATO's example says the contractors are making a separate supply to the provider that engaged them, not to the participant, so s38-38 does not apply to their invoices and they are taxable where the ordinary requirements are met. The provider's own supply to the participant can still be GST free.

Is NDIS income tax free?

GST and income tax are different questions. Revenue that is GST free is still assessable business income, so the GST treatment on this page says nothing about a practice's income tax position. That one belongs to the practice's own accountant.

GST answers

Is NDIS income GST-free?

Often, but not because it is NDIS money. A listed health service such as physiotherapy, occupational therapy, psychology or speech pathology is GST free under s38-10 whoever funds it, where it is appropriate treatment of the recipient of the supply. Anything else has to meet all four s38-38 requirements. Agency managed, plan managed and self managed change who pays, not which test applies. Split the two on your revenue accounts.

Key facts

The route most therapy takes: A listed health service performed by a recognised professional as appropriate treatment is GST free under s38-10, and that test does not ask who pays²
The four NDIS requirements: A plan in effect, the support named in the plan's statement of supports, a written agreement, and coverage by one of the two tables in the NDIS supports determination¹
Quantity is part of the test: Where a plan specifies a time or a quantity, supplies of supports beyond that specification are not GST free NDIS supplies¹
Who the supply is made to: Under normal circumstances supplies of NDIS supports are made to the participant, not to the plan manager¹
The determination is dated: It applies to supplies made on or after 1 July 2021 but before 1 July 2027¹
What the canonical templates post: All three post NDIS plan managed clinical revenue at GST Free Income, to account 405, 403 and 403, so the chart of accounts moves and the tax rate does not⁵
Where the decision lands: Every line of a bulk payment request carries a GST code: P1 for tax claimable, P2 for GST free, P5 for GST out of scope⁸

Two routes to GST free, not one

This reads as one question and is two. A supply to a participant can be GST free because the service itself is a listed health service under s38-10, which applies whoever pays. Or it can be GST free because the supply satisfies all four of the NDIS requirements in s38-38. Most allied health work delivered under a plan takes the first route and does not reach the second.

That distinction is missing from the answers a provider gets today. The four requirements lead the top results and the AI answer above them, and they are the right test for support work, non-listed group programs and therapy that is not on the list. They are not the test a physiotherapy session has to pass.

The listed service route

A health service that is not a medical service is GST free where three things hold together: it is one of the services the GST Act lists, it is performed by a recognised health professional in that listed service or, in the circumstances the ATO sets out, their assistant, and it is generally accepted in that profession as necessary for the appropriate treatment of the recipient of the supply. Occupational therapy, psychology, physiotherapy, podiatry, dietary services, nursing, speech pathology and social work are all on the list.

Nothing in those three conditions asks who pays. A physiotherapy session delivered to a participant stands on the same footing as the same session delivered to a private patient, so the NDIS requirements are not reached at all. The full list, and what it means for a private consult, is on is allied health GST free.

Physiotherapy, occupational therapy, psychology, speech pathology, podiatry, dietetics, social work and the other services on the ATO's listed-service list are GST-free under s38-10 for any payer, including NDIS, without needing to pass the four-part s38-38 test at all.⁵

That is the canonical NDIS template's own reason for the account it posts listed supports to. It travels with the row, so a practice approving its map reads why before anything syncs.

The four requirements when the service is not listed

For everything else, s38-38 is the test, and all four limbs have to hold together. Three are about the participant and the paperwork. The fourth is about the support, and it is the one that decides most disputes.

What each of the four requirements asks for¹

Requirement	What the ATO asks for
A plan in effect	The plan is approved by the agency under section 37 of the NDIS Act. It stops being in effect when another plan replaces it, or when the person stops being a participant.
Reasonable and necessary supports	The supply is of supports specified in the statement of supports in that plan. Where the plan specifies a time or a quantity, supplies beyond it are not GST free NDIS supplies.
A written agreement	Between the provider and the participant or another person, identifying the participant and stating that the supply is of supports specified in the plan. It can be one document or a combination of them.
Covered by the determination	The supply is covered by one of the two tables in the NDIS supports determination. Table 1 stands on its own. Table 2 is satisfied only where one of three other determinations covers the supply as well.

The determination the fourth requirement points at is a dated instrument rather than a standing rule: it applies to supplies made on or after 1 July 2021 but before 1 July 2027. Working the four limbs through a support that is not listed belongs to GST on non-listed NDIS supports, and the agreement itself to NDIS service agreements and GST.

Who the supply is made to

The ATO is direct about the recipient: under normal circumstances supplies of NDIS supports are made to the participant, not to the plan manager. Its worked example has a plan manager finding a therapist for a participant, entering the agreement on the participant's behalf, taking the invoices and paying them through the myplace provider portal from the participant's funds, and the therapist's supply is still a supply to the participant.

The same reasoning runs the other way for a subcontractor. Where a registered provider holds the agreement with the participant and engages contractors to do the work, those contractors are supplying services to the provider rather than to a participant, so s38-38 does not reach their invoices. The recipient of the supply is whoever engages the practitioner, which is the same rule that decides a clinic and practitioner split. GST on contractor invoices covers that side of it.

Agency managed, plan managed and self managed

Management type decides who holds the money and who the practice invoices. It does not decide which test the supply has to pass, because under normal circumstances the participant is the recipient in all three. The canonical templates encode exactly that: three funding sources, three sets of account codes, one tax rate.

How the three canonical templates post each management type⁶⁵⁷

Management type	Account code in each of the three templates	Tax rate on the revenue line	Categories at least one template pulls out of the default
Agency managed	404, 401, 402	GST Free Income	Non-listed supports
Plan managed	405, 403, 403	GST Free Income	Non-listed supports, reports, supervision, training, products, cancellation claims, travel, non-listed group programs
Self managed	406, 405, 404	GST Free Income	Non-listed supports

The last column is the union of the three templates, not any one of them. Reports are the only category all three pull out, so psychology plan managed work other than a report stays on the GST free default.

The deposit mechanics do differ, which is why each management type has its own funder page: NDIS agency managed payments in Xero, plan manager payments and self managed payments.

What the templates post for plan managed work

Each template writes its own row for NDIS plan managed revenue, so none of these postings is a fallback.

Plate 1The plan managed default as each canonical template resolves it: two account codes across three rows, one tax rate.

The account name carries the meaning and the tax rate carries the money. A practice moving between templates changes where this revenue sits and leaves the activity statement outcome alone, which makes the account a reporting choice rather than a tax one.

Where NDIS income stops being GST free

The categories the templates pull out of the default are the ones worth watching, because each is a supply of a different kind that happens to be funded from the same plan. Each has its own answer.

A support that is not a listed health service, where the four requirements have to be met in full. The ATO's own worked example is a clinic session that fails the fourth, covered on is exercise physiology GST free.
Reports, which all three templates pull out into their own account at the taxable rate. Whether plan funded therapy documentation belongs there is unsettled, so GST on NDIS report writing states the disagreement rather than closing it.
Training and capacity building workshops, which two of the three templates pull out at the taxable rate even when a plan funds them. The psychology template writes no row for them, so they take its plan managed default.
Products a participant takes home, which the allied health template pulls out at the taxable rate. The ATO reads goods as GST free where they are a necessary part of the service and supplied at the same time and place as the service.
Cancellation claims, which the NDIS template posts at the tax type of the invoice line they replace rather than at a Xero code of their own.
Travel, which the NDIS template gives its own account at GST Free Income while the other two leave it on the plan managed default.
Supervision sold to another practitioner, which the sources read two ways and this page does not settle. One template pulls it out at the taxable rate and the other two leave it on the plan managed default.

The GST code on the claim line

The decision eventually lands in a column. Every line of a bulk payment request to the agency carries a GST code: P1 for tax claimable at 10 percent, P2 for GST free, and P5 for GST out of scope. The unit price on the same line is capped at a price limit that is GST inclusive, so the code and the price are read together.

What that costs a provider who codes a taxable support as GST free is arithmetic are NDIS price limits GST inclusive works through. The point here is narrower: the code on the claim and the tax rate on the Xero line describe the same supply, so a mismatch between them is worth finding before the activity statement rather than after it.

Treating the whole job as GST-free because the client is an NDIS participant is a compliance error, and one the ATO sees regularly in BAS lodgements.¹⁰

The deposit and the revenue leg

A fortnight of participant work arrives as a small number of bank lines: a payment batch from the agency, a run from one plan manager, a card payment from a self managing participant. None of those lines says anything about the tax treatment of the sessions inside it.

So the two legs stay separate. A clearing account movement posts BAS excluded in every canonical template, because it moves money the practice has already earned and already posted. The tax rate belongs to the revenue lines underneath it, which is where the question on this page is decided.

What Ledger Map does with it

Ledger Map holds one standing map for the practice, approved before anything syncs. A participant line resolves through that map to an account and a tax rate, so the listed and non-listed split is decided once at the map rather than invoice by invoice.

The treatment is not one the product picked. The account, the rate and the reason all come from the canonical template the practice starts from, and a line the map cannot resolve becomes a question with the options laid out instead of a silent posting. Each deposit is then posted as one balanced document set, leaving one exact match in the bank feed for a person to accept. How it works shows the map and the approval step.

Questions

Is NDIS exempt from GST?
There is no blanket exemption for NDIS money. A listed health service is GST free under s38-10 whoever pays, so most therapy delivered under a plan is GST free on that basis alone. Any other support is GST free only where the four s38-38 requirements are all satisfied: a plan in effect, the support named in the plan's statement of supports, a written agreement, and coverage by the determination.
Does the management type change the answer?
Not for the tax test. The ATO says supplies of NDIS supports are made to the participant rather than to the plan manager, so agency managed, plan managed and self managed work all face the same two questions. What changes is who pays the practice and how the deposit lands, which is what the three funder pages cover.
Does the NDIS price guide include GST?
Where GST applies to a support, its price limit is inclusive of GST, so a taxable support billed at the limit collects less net revenue than a GST free one billed at the same limit. The Ledger Map page on NDIS price limits and GST works that difference through.
Do NDIS subcontractors charge GST?
The ATO's example says the contractors are making a separate supply to the provider that engaged them, not to the participant, so s38-38 does not apply to their invoices and they are taxable where the ordinary requirements are met. The provider's own supply to the participant can still be GST free.
Is NDIS income tax free?
GST and income tax are different questions. Revenue that is GST free is still assessable business income, so the GST treatment on this page says nothing about a practice's income tax position. That one belongs to the practice's own accountant.

Sources

Open questions

Supervision sold to another practitioner reads two ways in the sources this corpus holds. One reading treats it as a service to the supervisee rather than treatment of a patient, which makes it taxable. The other rests on an ATO interpretative decision reference for supervision of a provisionally registered psychologist, which points the other way on that fact pattern. Neither was read in full for this page, so the question stays open.
NDIS report writing reads two ways as well. Documentation funded in the plan as part of a therapy support is arguable as part of that support, while a report written for a school, an insurer or a court is a supply to that third party. The page on NDIS report writing holds the question rather than closing it.
Therapy assistant time is the third of these. On the listed service route the ATO includes an assistant's work in the recognised professional's own service where the billing, supervision and responsibility conditions are all met. Where those conditions are not met, the corpus leaves the reading of assistant services under the determination's tables open, and this page does not settle it.
The NDIS supports determination was not read directly for this page, so the two tables are described as the ATO summarises them rather than in the instrument's own words.
AustLII returned an error for the text of s38-38 on 3 Sep 2026, so the section is cited through the ATO's statement of it and no legislation source is listed below.
No NDIS price limit figure appears here, because ndis.gov.au blocks automated fetches and the price limit question belongs to its own page. The bulk payment request columns cited here come from the product's own tested module, which records the June 2025 provider guide read through an Internet Archive capture rather than fetched from ndis.gov.au, which is why that source is listed as secondary.
The four ATO pages cited refuse automated fetches and were read through a signed-in browser on 3 Sep 2026. Each carries the last updated date it prints, and a reader checking the wording will need to open them the same way.

GST and health: National Disability Insurance Scheme
Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 13 Jun 2024.
primary
GST and health: other health services
Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 12 Jun 2024.
primary
GST and health: recipient of the supply
Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 12 Jun 2024.
primary
GST and health: goods supplied as part of a GST-free health service
Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated 12 Jun 2024.
primary
NDIS provider, plan managed, the canonical template
Ledger Map. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026.
primary
Allied health by funding source, the canonical template
Ledger Map. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026.
primary
Psychology with booking deposits, the canonical template
Ledger Map. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026.
primary
Bulk payment requests, self help guide for providers
National Disability Insurance Agency. Retrieved 3 Sep 2026. Source updated Jun 2025.
secondary
NDIS pricing arrangements and price limits 2025-26, version 1.1
National Disability Insurance Agency. Retrieved 4 Sep 2026. Source updated 14 Oct 2025.
primary
Providing GST-free supplies to NDIS participants
RSM Australia. Retrieved 4 Sep 2026. Source updated 30 Jul 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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