New reporting requirements for Residential and Home Care Providers
The department is making changes to the financial reporting requirements for residential aged care and home care package providers.
New arrangements
A single template called the Aged Care Financial Report (ACFR) will consolidate the:
Annual Prudential Compliance Statement (APCS)
Building Activity component of the Survey of Aged Care Homes (SACH)
Home Care Financial Report (HCFR)
The existing General Purpose Financial Report (GPFR) which is currently submitted by all residential care providers will continue to be required.
The ACFR will be submitted at the same time as the GPFR.
Providers are not required to submit an audit opinion with their ACFR, however residential care providers will still be required to submit an audit opinion with their GPFR.
Providers of home care who do not also provide residential care will not be required to submit a GPFR and will only complete the home care section of the ACFR.
Flexibility to include mandated line items
Under the new arrangements, the current GPFR suggested residential segment format will be replaced by mandated line items at both the approved provider and residential segment level. However, providers will have the flexibility to include the mandated line items in their GPFR or ACFR. For example:
A provider might choose to report the Approved Provider Cash Flow Statement in their GPFR. If so all data items listed in the ACFR for inclusion in the cash flow statement must appear in the GPFR, while the cash flow statement in the ACFR would be blank. Note that under this option if a provider does not have a particular data item (i.e. dividends received) then there is no need to include the item in the GPFR cash flow with a zero balance.
Alternatively, a provider may decide to include the Residential Segment Income Statement in the ACFR (again ensuring all mandatory data items are completed), which would remove the department’s requirement for any residential care segment information to be included in the GPFR.
While providers have the flexibility to choose whether to include each of the components of the ACFR in either their GPFR or the ACFR, it is not possible to partially complete a component in both the GPFR and ACFR. Each individual component of the ACFR must be completed in its entirety in either the ACFR or the GPFR.
Start Date
The new financial reporting arrangements are mandatory for all residential and packaged home care providers for use in the 2016-17 financial year. This will mean that providers who report on a 30 June financial year-end basis will submit their reports under the new arrangements by 31 October 2017.
Online Submission
Providers will complete the ACFR online with data to be entered into a new online portal. Residential aged care providers will also upload and submit their audited GPFR through the online portal.
Legislative Changes
The introduction of the ACFR will require changes to the Accountability Principles 2014 and the Fees and Payments Principles 2014 (No. 2). Details of these changes will be available in early 2017.
Contacts
If you have any queries about this information email: FFBConsultation@health.gov.au or post to:
Director
Financial Performance Section, Department of Health
MDP 560, GPO Box 9848
Canberra ACT 2601
More Information
Read more at https://agedcare.health.gov.au/programs/residential-care/changes-to-financial-reporting-arrangements-for-residential-and-home-care-providers