Financial Intelligence that helps you protect every shift’s margin
Payroll tells you what the roster cost three weeks ago
Care providers lose margin when the roster is built, not when payroll runs. A three-hour NDIS personal care visit returns about 26% margin as rostered. Split it around one unpaid break and it falls to 14.1%. Roster a one-hour visit where the award requires a two-hour minimum and it runs at −48.1%. ShiftCare shows cost, revenue and margin on the shift while the roster is still a draft.
Shift costing is on Premium plans in Australia and is switched on by our support team.
The same three-hour visit, rostered five different ways
Providers brace for weekend and public holiday penalty rates. The NDIS prices those almost exactly, and the margin barely moves. What costs you is the shape of the roster.
Three-hour standard self-care visit, casual SACS Level 2, at the NDIS weekday price limit. Two of those one-hour visits a day, five days a week, loses about $18,400 a year. SCHADS rates from the first full pay period on or after 1 July 2026; NDIS limits from the 2026-27 Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits.
Where the money is actually decided
Four places the number gets set, and where to see each one.
What a shift costs, while you can still change it
Cost, revenue and margin on the scheduler tile, in the shift drawer’s Financials tab and in the Shift Details Report. Award-interpreted, drawn from Xero AU or PayCat Connect. Dollar values are role-gated, so a coordinator can make a cost-aware call without seeing what a colleague is paid.
Shift costingWhat the award does to the roster
Forty-six award rules run as a shift is created, updated or cancelled. Each warning names the SCHADS clause it relates to and the change that would resolve it. Hour caps can block outright.
SCHADS award interpretationWhat’s left of the participant’s funding
Every fund a participant holds, tracked separately with its own dates and balance. The remaining balance appears in the shift editor as the coordinator picks the fund, and the deduction happens when the shift is scheduled.
Funds managementGetting paid for care already delivered
Invoicing and NDIS payment requests built from the same shift records, with Xero, MYOB and QuickBooks Online connected. The claim comes from what was worked rather than being re-keyed from a timesheet.
Invoicing and integrationsThe same shift, two views
The scheduler, and the same shift as a support worker sees it.
Both are built mockups, not captures from a live account. On the phone, a support worker without financial permission sees no dollar figures at all.
What you need to know before you switch it on
Shift costing is on Premium plans in Australia and needs either Xero AU or PayCat Connect connected for cost data. It isn’t self-serve. Our support team enables it, and agrees your low-margin and loss-making thresholds with you rather than leaving the shipped defaults in place.
Figures are estimated and only finalised once a shift has been completed. Costs drawn from Xero AU include superannuation at 12%; costs drawn from PayCat Connect do not, so confirm which path your account uses before comparing numbers. Existing shifts are not costed until they are re-saved, so switching it on does not retrospectively price a roster you have already run.
Any questions?
Do weekend and public holiday penalty rates hurt an NDIS provider’s margin?
Much less than most providers expect. The NDIS sets higher price limits for Saturday, Sunday and public holiday supports, and those limits track the award penalties closely. On a three-hour personal care visit the margin is around 26.0% on a weekday and 26.7% on a public holiday. Broken shifts and short visits cost far more than the day of the week does.
What actually damages margin under the SCHADS Award?
The shape of the roster. Splitting a three-hour visit around one unpaid break takes the margin from about 26.0% to 14.1%; around two breaks, to 10.2%. Rostering a worker already at 38 hours, so every hour is overtime, takes it to 0.5%. A one-hour visit against a two-hour minimum engagement runs at about −48.1%.
Can I see what a shift costs before I roster it?
On Australian Premium accounts, yes. Cost, revenue and margin appear on the scheduler tile, in the shift drawer’s Financials tab and in the Shift Details Report, drawn from either Xero AU pay items or PayCat Connect. The figures are estimates and are only finalised once the shift has been completed.
Does shift costing include superannuation?
It depends which path your account uses. Costs drawn from Xero AU include superannuation at 12% by default. Costs drawn from PayCat Connect do not include superannuation. The same shift will show a different figure on each, so confirm which path your account is on before comparing numbers.
Can coordinators see what staff are paid if I turn shift costing on?
Not unless you give them full access. The account owner sees dollar figures. A user with the Shift Financials and Margin permission sees only whether a shift is profitable, low margin or loss-making, with no dollar amounts. Everyone else sees nothing. The restriction holds in the CSV export as well.
Does ShiftCare integrate with Xero?
Yes. Xero AU is one of the two sources ShiftCare can use for award-interpreted shift costing, the other being PayCat Connect, one or the other, never both. Invoices raised in ShiftCare also sync to Xero, and MYOB and QuickBooks Online are supported for invoicing.
What is the NDIS price limit for a standard weekday self-care hour?
$73.58 an hour for standard self-care on a weekday daytime, item 01_011_0107_1_1, under the NDIS Pricing Arrangements and Price Limits 2026-27 effective 1 July 2026. Saturday is $103.54 and public holiday is $163.46. Price limits move every 1 July, so check the current Pricing Arrangements before relying on any figure.
Already using ShiftCare? Step-by-step setup guides are in the help centre.
The other three intelligence hubs
The same roster and the same notes, read for a different question.
What a good progress note contains
The structure a note needs, and what Smart Note Coach asks for when a line is missing.
Read the hub Workforce intelligenceThe award decides the cost at rostering
Broken spans, rest gaps and overtime bands are fixed when the shift is placed, not when it is paid.
Read the hub Risk intelligenceThe incident that stayed in the note
Progress notes read as they arrive, with anything that looks like an incident raised for a person to confirm.
Read the hubBring your own roster patterns
The broken shifts, the short visits, the SIL house. Twenty minutes with an AU specialist and we’ll go through what they cost you, and switch costing on if it fits.