My Aged Care: How to Register, Get Assessed and Find a Provider (2026)

My Aged Care (myagedcare.gov.au, 1800 200 422) is the Australian Government’s entry point for all subsidised aged care. Nobody can receive a government-funded aged care service without going through it: registration, assessment, approval and referral all run through this one system. This guide walks through each step as it works in 2026, who can help you at each of them, and what to do at the step the government website is quietest about, which is choosing the provider at the end.

Carevo is a provider directory, not part of My Aged Care. Where this guide links to providers, that is our directory of 4,157 aged care providers; the official register is always linked alongside.

Step 1: Register (phone or online)

Two ways in, same result:

Phone: 1800 200 422. Monday to Friday 8am to 8pm, Saturday 10am to 2pm. Have your Medicare card ready. The call takes about 15 to 20 minutes and covers what help you need day to day, your health, and your safety at home. The line gets busy: calling just after 8am or after 5pm, and avoiding Mondays, usually means a shorter wait.

Online: myagedcare.gov.au. The “Apply for an assessment” form asks the same questions and takes about 15 to 30 minutes. There is no penalty for choosing phone over online; the whole process can be done without a computer.

Before you call

Registration goes fastest in one call if you have this ready:

• Medicare card number, full name and date of birth
• Phone number and home address
• A short description of what the person struggles with day to day
• Details of any services they already receive
• If someone is helping, that helper’s contact details and relationship

Write down the reference number My Aged Care gives you at the end. You need it for all future contact, so keep it with your Medicare card. It also helps to note the date, time and name of the person you spoke with on every call.

Someone else can do this for you. A family member or friend can call with you and your spoken consent, or be set up as your representative to deal with My Aged Care on your behalf permanently (how that works is covered below). If the person needing care cannot give consent, representative status can be arranged with legal documents such as an enduring power of attorney.

Step 2: The assessment (free, at home)

Registration leads to a referral under the Single Assessment System, which replaced the old split between RAS and ACAT teams. Which assessment you get depends on your needs:

• A home support assessment for entry-level needs, which can lead to Commonwealth Home Support Programme services such as cleaning, transport and social support.
• A comprehensive assessment (still widely called an ACAT assessment) for higher needs, which can approve you for Support at Home, respite, or residential care. Our ACAT assessment guide covers what the assessor asks and how the levels work.

The assessor visits you at home, usually within 2 to 6 weeks of referral depending on urgency and region. The assessment is free. Being honest about your worst days, not your best, is the single most useful preparation: approvals follow assessed need.

Preparing for the visit

A little preparation before the assessor arrives makes a real difference to the outcome:

• Write down every task the person needs help with, including the things they may not want to admit they struggle with
• List all medications and medical conditions, and note any recent changes in health, mobility or memory
• Prepare examples of specific incidents: falls, getting lost, missed medications
• A letter from your GP summarising conditions, medications and functional limits helps the assessor understand the full picture
• Clean the home but do not over-tidy. The assessor needs to see the real living situation

If a family member attends, they should let the person speak for themselves where possible, and gently correct understatements. Many older people downplay their difficulties. Ask the assessor to explain the outcome and what happens next, and request a copy of the assessment report. Our assessment preparation guide goes deeper on all of this.

Step 3: The approval letter

The outcome arrives as a letter and appears in your Online Account. For home care, new applicants are assigned one of eight Support at Home classifications, with annual budgets from $11,031.56 (Classification 1) to $80,294 (Classification 8) at current 2026-27 amounts. Support at Home replaced Home Care Packages for new participants on 1 November 2025; people who already held a package kept their funding as transitioned classifications.

Budgets release quarterly, clinical care is fully government funded, and contributions for other services depend on your means. There is no basic daily fee under Support at Home.

If demand exceeds places you may go on the National Priority System with an approval but no immediate allocation. Ask your assessor for your expected wait; entry-level CHSP support can often start in the meantime.

Your Online Account (the portal)

The Online Account is reached through myGov (there is no separate app). It shows your assessment outcomes and approvals, your referral codes (the codes a provider needs to start services), current services, and your representative arrangements. Everything the portal does can also be done on 1800 200 422, so nobody is locked out of aged care for not using myGov. If the online account is the part you find tricky, our My Aged Care portal guide explains it step by step.

The portal does not compare providers, show prices, or tell you who has capacity. That is the step you do yourself.

Step 4: Finding a provider

Approval in hand, you choose the provider. Two places to look:

• The official Find a provider tool on myagedcare.gov.au lists every registered provider and their compliance history. It does not show whether a provider is taking new clients or how quickly they respond.
• Our aged care provider directory shows coverage by suburb, measured response times, and whether a provider is currently taking new clients, across 4,157 providers. The Support at Home provider guide explains what to compare.

Compare prices before signing anything. Support at Home price caps were deferred in May 2026, so two registered providers can charge different hourly rates for the same support, and a lower unit price buys more hours from the same budget. Ask for the complete price list in writing, confirm care management stays within the 10 percent cap, and check the provider staffs your suburb with its own workers.

Give your chosen provider the referral code from your Online Account, agree a service schedule, and read the Service Agreement before anyone signs it. Then services can begin.

Who can help you apply

The system is built on the assumption that many applicants will have help. Asking for it is normal, not a failure. The people who most often step in:

Family and friends. The most common helpers. A spouse, adult child or friend can make the initial call, sit alongside you for the online form, gather documents, attend the assessment to add detail about daily needs, and be appointed as your formal representative. If they are helping, they should still include you in every decision; the paperwork can be delegated, the choices should not be.

Your GP. You do not need a GP referral to register, but a doctor’s involvement speeds things up. GPs can contact My Aged Care directly to register a patient, write a supporting letter covering conditions, medications and functional limits, compile specialist information into one summary, and tell My Aged Care when a situation is urgent. Talk to your GP about aged care after a fall, a dementia diagnosis, a hospital stay, or when daily tasks like cooking and bathing are becoming hard. Your GP is often the first professional to notice.

Social workers. Trained navigators of exactly this kind of system. Every public hospital has them, many community health centres and some councils employ them, and private ones are listed in the Australian Association of Social Workers directory. They can help complete forms, advocate during assessments, connect you with services you did not know existed, and mediate when family members disagree about care.

Community organisations. Neighbourhood centres, religious communities, veterans’ organisations (RSL, Legacy, DVA), and seniors’ bodies such as COTA in each state all help older people through applications, often free. Your local council or library can point you to what operates in your area, or ask My Aged Care itself on 1800 200 422.

OPAN: free aged care advocacy

The Older Persons Advocacy Network (OPAN) is funded by the Australian Government to provide free, confidential and independent advocacy for older people. It is one of the most useful and least used resources in the system.

OPAN advocates are not connected to any provider. They can explain your rights under the Aged Care Act, attend assessments with you, help you prepare questions, help you lodge a complaint or request a review if you disagree with an outcome, and step in when there are problems with a current provider. OPAN also publishes a free self-advocacy toolkit with step-by-step guides.

Call the Aged Care Advocacy Line on 1800 700 600 (Monday to Friday 8am to 8pm, Saturday 10am to 4pm) to be connected with the advocacy organisation in your state or territory, or request support through the OPAN website.

Applying from hospital

If you or a loved one is in hospital and will need aged care on discharge, do not wait until you are home. Hospital social workers and discharge planners can register you with My Aged Care and arrange an in-hospital assessment before you leave. These are often arranged faster than community assessments because the clinical team can evidence care needs directly, and occupational therapists and physiotherapists on the ward can document home-modification and mobility needs for the assessors.

If you are worried about going home without support: ask for the social work or discharge planning team, say you want to be registered with My Aged Care before discharge, request an in-hospital assessment, and ask what interim services can start while you wait for ongoing funding. For the gap between hospital and aged care services, ask about the Transition Care Programme, which provides short-term care for up to 12 weeks after a hospital stay.

Help in other languages

If English is not your first language, interpreting support is free at every step:

• TIS National (131 450) covers more than 200 languages, 24 hours a day
• When you call 1800 200 422, tell the operator which language you need and an interpreter joins the call
• For the assessment visit, you can request a face-to-face interpreter at no charge

The government also funds organisations in each state to support culturally appropriate care. These groups can help with applications in community languages, find providers offering appropriate food, religious observance and language-matched staff, and advocate when cultural needs are not being met. Groups serving specific communities (Italian, Greek, Chinese, Vietnamese and many others) often provide this navigation help directly.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people can access aged care from age 50 rather than the standard 65 (myagedcare.gov.au eligibility). Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations can help with registration and assessments, some providers specialise in culturally safe care, and you can ask My Aged Care to connect you with a culturally appropriate assessor. Assessors should take cultural practices, connection to country, and family and community structures into account.

Setting up a representative

Helping someone with a phone call is informal. A representative is a formal arrangement recorded by My Aged Care, and it matters when help is ongoing.

A representative can be a family member, close friend, legal guardian, attorney under a power of attorney, or a professional advocate. To set one up:

1. Call 1800 200 422, during initial registration or any time after
2. The person receiving care gives spoken consent on the call, or written consent. If they lack capacity to consent, legal documentation such as a power of attorney or guardianship order may be required
3. Choose the level of access: full (make decisions and manage services) or view-only
4. My Aged Care records the representative’s details and relationship

A formal representative is close to essential when the person has dementia or cognitive impairment, is in hospital and cannot take calls, or simply prefers someone else to run the administrative side. Once registered, the representative can call, receive updates and make service decisions without re-explaining the situation every time.

Common problems, briefly

Lost referral code. Visible in your Online Account, or call 1800 200 422 to have it re-issued.

Assessment is taking too long. The usual window is 2 to 6 weeks after registration. If the need is urgent, say so when you register, ask your GP to call My Aged Care and support an urgent referral, and ask about CHSP services as a stopgap. In hospital, request the assessment before discharge.

Disagree with the outcome. Ask the assessment organisation for a review first, and call 1800 200 422 to request a reassessment. OPAN (1800 700 600) can advocate for you through this. Extra medical evidence from your GP or specialists strengthens the request, and a diary of daily difficulties shows assessors what a bad week actually looks like. If unresolved, the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission handles provider complaints at any time.

Needs have changed. Call 1800 200 422 and ask for a reassessment. A hospital stay, a fall, or a carer’s circumstances changing all justify one.

Not eligible yet. Support that does not require My Aged Care exists: private home care needs no assessment, and the Carer Gateway (1800 422 737) supports the carer rather than the person receiving care.

Tips for families helping a parent

Start the conversation early. Do not wait for a crisis. Frame aged care as support that keeps them independent at home for longer, not as a loss of independence.

Respect their wishes. Your parent may have firm views on what help they want and from whom. Listen and honour them where you can, even when you disagree. The paperwork is yours to carry; the decisions are still theirs.

Be patient and share the load. Registration to services can take weeks, sometimes months for higher classifications. If you have siblings, split the roles: one on calls and paperwork, one at appointments, everyone in one group chat or shared document.

Keep records. One folder, physical or digital: the reference number, assessment reports, provider agreements and schedules, receipts, and notes from every phone call. It becomes invaluable in any dispute or follow-up application.

Know the signs it is time. Unexplained weight loss, laundry and dishes piling up, missed medications or appointments, falls or near-falls, confusion, social withdrawal, unpaid bills. One or two of these is enough reason to look at what support exists.

Look after yourself. Supporting a parent through this is draining. The Carer Gateway (1800 422 737) exists for you, not the person receiving care.

Useful contacts

Frequently asked questions

How long does the whole process take?

The registration call takes about 15 to 20 minutes. An assessor usually makes contact within 2 to 6 weeks. From first call to services starting is typically several weeks, and can stretch to months for higher Support at Home classifications if you spend time on the National Priority System.

Do I need a computer to register?

No. The entire process, from registration through to giving a provider your referral code, can be done on 1800 200 422. The Online Account through myGov is a convenience, not a requirement.

Is help with the application free?

Yes. My Aged Care contact centre staff walk people through registration every day, OPAN advocacy (1800 700 600) is free and independent, interpreters through TIS National are free, and the assessment itself is free. Paid help (aged care placement services, specialist financial advisers) exists but is optional, and mostly matters for residential care decisions such as the means-tested fee and refundable accommodation deposits.

Can someone register on my behalf?

Yes, with your spoken consent on the call, or formally as your representative. If you cannot give consent, documents such as an enduring power of attorney or a guardianship order can establish the arrangement.

What if I disagree with my assessment?

Request a review through the assessment organisation, then a reassessment through 1800 200 422 if needed. OPAN can advocate for you, and supporting evidence from your GP makes the strongest case.

What is the difference between CHSP and Support at Home?

CHSP is the entry-level program: individual subsidised services such as cleaning or transport after a home support assessment. Support at Home is the budget-based program that replaced Home Care Packages on 1 November 2025, reached through the higher-level assessment, with eight classifications and quarterly budgets.

Approved and choosing a provider?

Registration and assessment are the government’s side. Choosing well at the end is yours, and it is the step with the least official guidance. Carevo connects you with aged care providers across Australia: browse providers by suburb to see who covers your area and is taking new clients, or call 1800 953 253 and we will help you compare your options. Carevo is a connection platform; the providers you choose deliver the care, and the decision always stays with you.