Can a nominee or family member approve instead?

Yes. Approval requests go to the contacts recorded against the participant, so a nominee, guardian or family member who manages their supports can receive and action them. Whoever responded is recorded by name against the invoice.

Is a link-based approval secure enough for audit?

Each request carries a single-purpose token tied to that invoice, and the response records the channel, the responder and the timestamp. That is a stronger evidence trail than a phone call noted in a file, which is what it replaces.

Participant Approval for NDIS Providers

A plan-managed invoice cannot be claimed until the participant has agreed to it. Chasing that agreement by phone is where invoices go to sit for three weeks. Rostery asks for it in the way each participant will actually answer.

Participant approval — how it works

When an invoice is ready, an approval request goes out by app notification, email or SMS. The participant sees the provider, the dates, what was delivered and the amount, and approves or declines in one tap — no account or login needed if they came from a link.

The response is written back to the invoice with the channel it came through, the name of whoever approved it and the timestamp. Declines capture a reason and route the invoice back for review rather than into a void. Requests can be sent automatically as soon as an invoice passes validation, so nobody has to remember to ask.

Why it matters for NDIS providers

Approval is both a compliance requirement and the main cause of ageing invoices. Providers chase payment, participants get called at work, and the plan manager sits in the middle with nothing recorded. Getting agreement in writing, quickly, protects everyone.

Answered where they are: app, email or SMS, so the channel matches the participant rather than the office.
No login to approve: a link is enough, which is the difference between a same-day answer and a fortnight.
Recorded as evidence: channel, name and timestamp are stored against the invoice for audit.

What's included

Multi-channel requests. The same request sent by push notification, email or SMS.
One-tap response. Approve or decline without creating an account or remembering a password.
Decline reasons. A declined invoice captures why and returns for review rather than disappearing.
Automatic sending. Requests can go out as soon as an invoice passes validation.
Approval audit trail. Who approved, through which channel, and when — held against the invoice.

Who it's for

Plan managers whose participants range from confident app users to people who will only ever answer a text message, and nominees or family members who approve on a participant’s behalf. Anyone whose ageing report is full of invoices waiting on a phone call will recognise the problem this solves.

Getting started

Participant Approval is included in your Rostery plan and works the moment your data is in — there is no separate module to buy or set up. Book a demo and we will show it on your own workflows, and use Rostery's “Smart Switch” data migration to bring your existing clients, staff, shifts and notes across from your current software in minutes.

Terms used on this page

Related capabilities

Source

The rules this feature works to are set by NDIS — Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits, which is the authority on them and is updated more often than any page here.

Why teams love Participant Approval

Automatic, in-app or manual

Set the approval mode per participant to match how they actually want to work.

Recorded, not remembered

Channel, person, timestamp and note are stored against the invoice.

A decline goes somewhere

The reason is captured and the invoice returns to be fixed, not lost.

Invoices stop ageing on a phone call

A text message answered in a minute replaces a callback that never happens.

Automatic once validated

Requests can send themselves the moment an invoice is eligible, so nothing waits on a person remembering.

Participant Approval — questions

The invoice stays in the awaiting-approval queue with its age visible, and the request can be resent through a different channel. The register can be filtered to exactly the invoices waiting on a participant, so following up is a list to work rather than a memory exercise.

Participant Approval