Home Care Package Levels in Australia — The 2026 Support at Home Guide

If you're searching for "home care package levels," the system you're looking for no longer exists. On 1 November 2025, the Australian Government replaced the four Home Care Package (HCP) levels with eight Support at Home classifications. The change affects funding amounts, how needs are assessed, and how much families pay out of pocket.

Here's what the new system looks like and how it maps to the old one.

What Changed on 1 November 2025

The legacy Home Care Package program had four levels — Level 1 (basic care needs, ~$9,000/year) through Level 4 (high care needs, ~$56,000/year). These levels were broad, and many families fell between tiers with no flexibility.

Support at Home replaced this with eight ongoing classifications. Each classification is funded quarterly (not annually), and the funding amount is tied directly to the Single Assessment System evaluation of the recipient's functional needs — not a broad category label.

The key difference: those "gap" classifications (2, 4, 6, 8) didn't exist before. Families who needed more than Level 2 but less than Level 3 had to wait for an upgrade that might never come. Now the assessment tool places recipients more precisely.

How the New Classifications Are Assigned

Under the old system, ACAT teams assigned a level based on a relatively brief assessment. The new Single Assessment System (SAS) uses a computerized Integrated Assessment Tool (IAT) that scores recipients across 12 clinical and functional domains — cognition, continence, mobility, nutrition, skin integrity, and more.

The classification a parent receives depends on the severity and complexity documented during this home visit. This is why assessment preparation matters: if a parent masks their struggles (common with dementia or pride), the IAT may assign a lower classification than their actual needs warrant.

What Each Classification Funds

All eight classifications cover the same service categories — the difference is how many hours per quarter the budget can purchase:

• Clinical supports (nursing, allied health, wound care) — fully government-funded regardless of classification
• Independence supports (personal care, showering, dressing) — means-tested co-contribution of 5–50%
• Everyday living supports (cleaning, meals, gardening) — means-tested co-contribution of 17.5–80%

A Classification 4 budget of ~$7,617 per quarter, after the mandatory 10% care management deduction, leaves roughly $6,855 for actual services. At typical provider rates of $95–$150/hour depending on the service, that translates to about 50–70 hours of care per quarter.

Quarterly Budget Rollovers

One significant change: the old HCP system allowed unlimited rollover of unspent funds year to year. Under Support at Home, quarterly rollover is capped at $1,000 or 10% of the quarterly budget, whichever is higher. Any unspent balance above that threshold is returned to the government.

If your parent was already receiving a Home Care Package before 1 November 2025, their existing unspent funds are grandfathered into a separate budget with no rollover cap.

What This Means for Families

The eight-classification system is more precise, but it also means the assessment carries higher stakes. A Classification 3 versus a Classification 4 is a difference of roughly $2,500 per quarter — over $10,000 per year in government funding.

Families preparing for an assessment should document their parent's functional limitations on their worst days, gather GP and specialist reports, and have an adult child present during the home visit to advocate clearly.

For a step-by-step preparation framework covering assessment prep, provider selection, means testing, and budget management under the 2026 rules, the Australia Home Care Guide walks through the entire process from My Aged Care registration to quarterly budget reconciliation.

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