Activity Costs
Activity Costs can be used for Non-NDIS Billing and allow providers to generate Client Invoices for an individual fixed dollar amount or to track expenditure of these costs if Invoices are not required.
Staff with the privileges required to manage Activities can specify whether or not GST is applicable to these Activity Costs via a setting in the Activity record. In addition, Staff with Finance Admin privileges can update Individual Activity Costs along with the associated 'Cost Funded By' setting in a Signed Off Activity, up to the point where they are included in an Invoice.
This article discusses how to add Individual Activity Costs, update the related Activity Cost Funded By setting, how to update Individual Activity Costs in Signed Off Activities as required as well as how to report on Activity Costs.
Privileges:
- All Staff with access to the Activity can update the Activity Costs and Costs Funded By setting up until the Activity Sign Off is completed
- Only Staff with the privileges required to manage Activities can update the 'Add GST to all activity costs when invoicing' setting in System Preferences
- Finance Admin (those with the 'View Financial Information' privilege in combination with either the 'Edit ALL Client Records', or 'Team Leader for ALL Services' privilege) is required to update Individual Activity Costs in Signed Off Activities
Audience: Finance Team, Team Leaders
Summary
The following list summarises the content within this article. Click on the links below to take you to the relevant sections:
- Individual Activity Costs
- Updating the 'Activity Costs Funded By' setting to reflect how the Client will be charged
- Apply GST to Activity Costs setting
- Updating the 'Add GST to all activity costs when invoicing' setting in System Preferences
- Using Individual Activity Costs to charge for incidental costs
- Using Individual Activity Costs to charge for service delivery
- Activity Cost composition
- How to update Individual Activity Costs in Signed Off Activities
- How to report on Activity Costs
Individual Activity Costs
Individual Activity Costs are added in the Activity Cost field for the relevant Client/s in the Activity record.
They can be used to generate an Invoice for the total cost of the services delivered e.g. $60:
Or for any additional costs incurred as part of service delivery e.g. a $12 billable charge in addition to the NDIS Funded Supports:
Updating the 'Activity Costs Funded By' setting to reflect how the Client will be charged
Following the Activity Cost being entered, the corresponding 'Activity Costs Funded By' section may need to be updated to reflect how the Client is paying for this charge:
The three available options are:
- Billable
- Funding Source, or
- Client Paid Using Own Money
When Billable is selected, an Invoice can be generated for the Client or the Client's Billing Contact to pay for this cost directly. This is the default selection when the Client's Funding Source is set to their NDIS Funding, as outlined in an example below.
When Funding Source is selected, the Activity Cost will be related to the selected Non-NDIS Funding Source i.e. a Non-NDIS Funding record or Billable (No Funding). When a Non-NDIS Funding record is used as the Client's Funding Source, expenditure is accrued against this in the Utilisation tab of the Client's Non-NDIS Funding record, as outlined in an example below.
When Client Paid Using Own Money is selected, this simply indicates that no further action is required as the cost has been covered and is only applicable if your organisation wishes to track this.
Apply GST to Activity Costs setting
The 'Apply GST to Activity Costs' setting is available in the Activity Details section of the Activity record which determines if GST is applied to Activity Costs when Invoice Batches are generated:
This setting is on by default, meaning GST is applied to Activity Costs when Invoice Batches are generated. This can be deselected by Staff with the privileges required to manage Activities if GST should not be applied to Activity Costs for this Activity. Please see the Privileges required to manage Activities article linked below for more information regarding this.
There is also a setting in System Preferences that can be updated to turn the 'Apply GST to Activity Costs' setting off by default in all Activities if required as outlined below.
Updating the 'Add GST to all activity costs when invoicing' setting in System Preferences
The 'Add GST to all activity costs when invoicing' setting can be set globally for all Activities on the Settings tab in System Preferences and is set to active by default:
However, if your organisation does not wish to apply GST to Activity Costs by default, you may wish to turn this off. Noting that this can always been selected as required in the Activity record by Staff with the required privileges.
Using Individual Activity Costs to charge for incidental costs
When incidental costs are incurred as part of an Activity that needs to be charged to the individual, this can be recorded against the individual in the Activity Cost field e.g: $12:
When a Client is paying for an Activity using NDIS Funding, this Funding Source cannot be used to pay for the Activity Cost charge. The only options to select from in 'Activity Costs Funded By' are Billable or Client Paid Using Own Money. Please see below for more on this.
If the Client has a relevant Support Category in their NDIS Funding record to cover this charge, the appropriate Support will need to be allocated in the Client's NDIS Support Allocations instead. Please review the Allocating NDIS Support Items in Activities article linked below for more information.
Once the Activity Sign Off is performed:
- NDIS Support Allocations for the NDIS Supports utilised will be available for financial processing in Direct Bulk Payment Requests (BPRs) or Direct Invoice Batches, based on how the Client's Financial Plan Manager (FPM) has been configured
- Activity Costs for the billable charges will be available for inclusion in Direct Invoice Batches:
Return to Summary
Using Individual Activity Costs to charge for service delivery
Activity Costs can be used to charge for service delivery for Clients who are paying your organisation directly or are paying using another Non-NDIS Funding Source e.g. TAC or Clinical Funding.
For example, in our Exercise Physiology group, there are three participants. Caileigh has NDIS Funding, therefore NDIS Support Allocations have been added for her as this is how she will be paying for her participation in this group.
Whereas Tim and Amelia are privately funded, therefore an individual Activity Cost of $55.66 has been added for each of these individuals: The Funding Source has been set up in a different way for each of these Clients to demonstrate how this can be utilised:
- Tim has a Clinical Non-NDIS Funding record as this is required in order to track Utilisation and Expenditure in addition to generating Invoices
- Amelia is paying for this via Billable (No Funding) which means a Billable Invoice will be generated, however, we suggest the use of 'Billable (No Funding' is reserved for incidental one-off Activity Costs as expenditure related to this is not as easy to track given it is not a Funding Type
Non-NDIS Funding record - required to track expenditure
Tim has a Clinical Non-NDIS Funding record that is being utilised to generate Invoices for his participation in this Activity:
As well as to allow expenditure to be tracked in the Utilisation tab of his Non-NDIS Funding record:
Client Funding Statements can also be generated for Non-NDIS Funding records and includes any expenditure:
Billable (No Funding) - when tracking expenditure is not required
Amelia does not have a Non-NDIS Funding record and is therefore being charged for these costs directly given the Funding Source is set to 'Billable (No Funding).
Invoices for these costs will appear on the Funding tab of her Client record:
And can be located using the Direct Invoice Search, however, expenditure is not tracked given there is no Funding record associated. Hence using Billable (No Funding) is recommended for incidental costs only.
Activity Cost composition
There may be times when the dollar value being entered into the Activity Cost field is made up of a combination of separate charges.
Using an example of a trip to the movies, the costs associated with this Activity might include:
- $16 - Movie Ticket
- $15 - Popcorn and Drink
- $9 - Transport
However, only the total value of the Activity can be entered into the Activity Cost field (e.g. $40.00).
When an Invoice is generated from this Activity, the Activity Cost will appear as Activity Costs 1x $40.00.
In some circumstances, there may be a requirement to provide a Client with more transparency around the composition of the Activity Cost. A workaround for this is explained in the following section.
Using the Activity Description field to detail the composition of the Activity Cost
In instances where greater transparency needs to be provided to Clients relating to the composition of Activity Costs, the Activity Description field of the corresponding Activity can be utilised to achieve this.
Using the example of a trip to the movies, additional details can be added to the Activity Description to show that the Activity included a Ticket, Snacks and Transport.
Once the Activity Sign Off is completed and the corresponding Invoice has been generated, this additional information will be included on the Invoice under the 'Activity' heading.
As shown in the example below, ' Trip to the Movies - Ticket, Snacks and Transport' is now displayed under the 'Activity' header of the corresponding Invoice.
If required, further details (e.g. price itemisation or an hourly rate) could be included in the Activity Description field to provide greater transparency.
In the example below, the Activity Description field of the corresponding Activity has been used to indicate that the $240.00 Activity Charge was made up of two hours of Speech Therapy at $120 per hour.
How to update Individual Activity Costs in Signed Off Activities
Individual Activity Costs can be updated by Staff with Finance Admin privileges, along with the associated 'Cost Funded By' setting in a Signed Off Activity, up to the point where they have been included in an Invoice:
For example, if the Activity Cost was actually $12 including GST, given GST is added at the point the Invoice Batch is generated, the Activity Cost can be updated to correct this e.g. $10.91:
Once the Activity record is saved, this updated cost will be available immediately when generating a Direct Invoice Batch:
How to report on Activity Costs
Information relating to Activity Costs for individual Clients as entered in the Client Section of the Activity are displayed at the end of the Activity Clients Report export and include the following columns:
- Activity Costs Ex GST - the Activity Cost as entered in the Activity for the individual Client less GST
- Activity Costs GST - the GST amount is automatically calculated based on the Activity Cost
- Activity Costs Inc GST - the Activity Cost relating to the individual Client inclusive of GST
- Activity Costs Funded By - how the Activity Cost is being funded. Options include 'Client Paid Using Own Money' or 'Billable'
N.B. If GST is not being added to Activity Costs for an individual Activity as per the configuration, i.e. 'Add GST to all activity costs when invoicing' setting is not selected, then 'Activity Cost GST' will appear as 0, and the 'Activity Costs Ex GST' and 'Activity Costs Inc GST' amounts will be the same:
Please see the Activity Clients Report article linked below for more information.