Ability Directory / Guides for providers
Easy Read for NDIS providers: what the Practice Standards ask and where to start
Registered NDIS providers are expected to explain their supports to each participant in a way that participant can understand. The Standards cover the service agreement, the supports and how to make a complaint. This guide covers what the NDIS Practice Standards say about it, what Easy Read is, and how to try it on one document.
What the Practice Standards ask
The NDIS Practice Standards and Quality Indicators are published by the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission. They ask registered providers to communicate with participants in the language, mode of communication and terms each participant is most likely to understand. The wording appears in more than one place, including the standards on rights and responsibilities, access to supports, and service agreements. Complaints are covered separately: under the core module, each participant is to be given information on how to make a complaint, including avenues outside your organisation and their right to access an advocate.
Read the standards for the exact wording that applies to your registration group: NDIS Practice Standards.
What Easy Read is
Easy Read is a format with short sentences, one idea on each line, plain words, and a picture beside each line. Hard words get a short explanation. The Commission publishes Easy Read versions of its own material at its Easy Read resources page, which show what the format looks like in practice.
Which documents to start with
A good place to start is the documents that decide what happens to a participant:
- The service agreement.
- A summary of the supports in the agreement.
- How to make a complaint.
- What happens if the participant wants to stop or change a support.
You do not need to convert everything. One document, done well, shows you whether participants and their families find it useful.
How to try one document
- Pick the document participants ask about most.
- Cut it to what the participant needs to know and do. Keep the full legal version available beside it.
- Write each point as one short sentence with one idea.
- Add a picture beside each sentence.
- Ask a participant, a family member or an advocate to read it and tell you where they got stuck.
- Change what they flagged, then give the Easy Read version next to the full one.
Step 5 matters most. Writing in Easy Read style does not show by itself that a participant will understand the result. Only a reader can show you that.
Want us to do one for you
Alexandra Swan (ABN 22 415 755 778) turns one of your documents into Easy Read, with one consistent set of pictures and a stated price. You can look at a sample first. Reader testing is not part of the service, so step 5 above stays with you.
More Easy Read guides
- Guide 2 covers writing a service agreement a participant can read
- Guide 3 covers writing a complaints process a participant can read
Sources
- NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, NDIS Practice Standards.
- NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, Easy Read resources.
General information only, not legal advice. Check the current standards before you act on them.