From 1 October 2026, Schedule E SCHADS workers get a 15% pay rise. What NDIS home care providers need to check before payroll.
The first of October is a payroll date every home care and disability provider in Australia needs to be across right now.
From that date, home care disability workers covered by Schedule E of the SCHADS Award are entitled to a pay increase of around 15%. This isn’t a surprise. It’s been building since June. And the providers who prepare now are the ones who won’t be scrambling when it lands.
Where it comes from
On the first of June 2026, the Fair Work Commission handed down a decision in the gender based undervaluation review. This is a long running process the Commission ran across several awards, examining whether work performed predominantly by women had been paid at a lower rate than equivalent work, for no reason other than who was doing it.
For the SCHADS Award, the Commission found that home care disability workers under Schedule E had been underpaid relative to comparable work. Specifically, relative to aged care home care workers, who received their own 15% correction back in 2023.
The Commission’s reasoning was direct. There’s no basis to value the work of supporting a disability client less than the work of supporting an aged care client. The gap existed because of how the award was structured historically, not because of any real difference in what the work involves.
That finding is the basis for the October increase.
Who it applies to, and at what rate
For most Schedule E classifications, the increase is 15%, applied to the current base rate, effective from the first full pay period on or after 1 October 2026.
Two pay points sit slightly below that. Level 4, Pay Point 2, and Level 5, Pay Point 2, receive increases of just under 15% rather than the full figure. Those two pay points already sit close enough to their eventual restructured rate that applying the full 15% would overshoot.
If you have team members at either of those pay points, don’t apply a blanket 15%. Pull the actual award rate for that classification and confirm the exact figure before you run payroll.
A note on the status of this decision
Technically, this 15% is still described by the Commission as a provisional view, not a fully finalised determination. The Commission gave interested parties a window to file submissions after handing the decision down. That said, the Commission has also stated it doesn’t expect a further hearing will be necessary to finalise this specific point.
Practically, you should be budgeting and planning around 15% now. If you’re locking numbers into a signed contract or an enterprise agreement, check the Fair Work Commission’s case page for a confirmed final determination before you do.
Schedule E and where it sits
This is the part that trips providers up constantly, and the October increase makes it more important than ever to get right.
Schedule coverage under the SCHADS Award comes down to two things: the setting the work happens in, and the actual duties performed. Not the funding source. Not the job title. Not what your rostering software calls the shift.
Here’s how the schedules break down.
Schedule B covers social and community services work. Disability support delivered as part of a shared or communal service model. Group homes, day programs, community access, case management. If your support worker is delivering shared, rostered support across multiple residents at one address, or running a community access shift, that’s Schedule B. This increase does not apply.
Schedule C covers crisis accommodation and supported housing. Homelessness services, refuges, transitional housing. Also outside this increase.
Schedule D covers family day care coordination unit staff. Also not touched by this increase.
Schedule E is home care, disability care. Domestic assistance, personal care, or home maintenance delivered to a participant funded by the NDIS, in that participant’s own private home, one on one. This is the only schedule the October increase applies to.
Schedule F is home care for aged care clients. Same kind of work, same setting, and for an aged care client rather than an NDIS client. Aged care home care workers received their own correction in 2023. This increase isn’t for them.
The SIL classification problem
There are two classification boundaries that cause ongoing confusion, and both of them matter more now that the rates are moving.
The first is Schedule B versus Schedule E. Both can involve a disability support worker supporting a disability participant. The difference isn’t the participant, and it isn’t the NDIS funding category. It’s the actual setting and how support is delivered.
A support worker delivering shared, rostered support across a household with multiple residents is Schedule B. The same worker visiting a participant’s own private home, one on one, for personal care, is Schedule E. Same job title, same kind of support, different schedule, different rate. The deciding factor is the arrangement underneath.
Supported Independent Living makes this genuinely complicated. SIL is an NDIS funding category, not a SCHADS classification. The award doesn’t know what the NDIS calls the arrangement.
Under newer SIL models, individualised SIL can mean one participant, living alone in their own private residence, receiving one on one support. That arrangement can sit under Schedule E, even though it’s funded and labelled as SIL. Traditional shared SIL, multiple participants at one address with support rostered across the household, is more likely to sit under Schedule B.
You can’t classify by the word SIL on a funding schedule. You have to look at what’s actually happening. How many participants live at the address. Whether support is delivered one on one to an individual in their own home, or shared and rostered across a household.
If you haven’t reviewed your Schedule classifications recently, now is the time. Getting this wrong doesn’t just affect your payroll for October. It means you may have been paying workers at the wrong rate already.
## What to do before October
Three things to get done now.
One. Identify every worker on your payroll classified under Schedule E and confirm their current pay point.
Two. Calculate the adjusted rate for each, using the actual award figures for their classification. For Level 4 PP2 and Level 5 PP2, confirm the exact percentage rather than applying a flat 15%.
Three. Review your funding agreements, service agreements, and pricing to understand how this affects your margins. If you’re delivering NDIS home care supports under the current pricing schedule, your rates may not absorb this increase without adjustment.
The Fair Work Commission’s case page is the primary source. For current award rates, the Fair Work Ombudsman pay guide for MA000100 is where you go. Don’t rely on third-party summaries, including this one, for final figures. Confirm directly from the source before you run payroll.