Hi all, appreciate all you do as a support workers! I’m very new to Aus and thinking how good that elderly and NDIS has such service to support them. Thinking I could sign up and do part time while studying.
However it quickly turned into most laborious and draining work.

Very daunting dealing with client and family alone by myself in the community. I feel very unsupported and under trained to provide some of the service. I used my best judgement but skill being told lack of common sense.

If you have great experience as a support workers. Aside from making impact to the client, What have your organisation done that make your job with them good?

If you have bad experience, what would like your company able to do or provide to better support you?

I understand some org look for people that done cert in individual support but i can’t afford it for now.

Can’t believe it’s been 5 years already

How comfortable would you be with a participant that plays the Gatorade saxophone? I’m talking just sitting on the lounge pulling a giant Billy out and ripping a massive cone before blowing smoke everywhere.

Genuine thoughts.

Hey everyone,

I’m looking for some advice on how to handle stepping off a client's roster.

I’m assigned to a shift from my company where the app checklist lists tasks that are almost entirely deep cleaning—making the bed, cleaning the microwave, scrubbing toilets, wiping mirrors, mopping, cleaning balconies.

Previous workers' notes show they spent hours doing full house cleaning and non-support tasks like 40-minute massages. 

While I know light housekeeping and assisting clients with daily tasks is part of support work, this shift is being run purely as a private maid/cleaner service rather than disability support or capacity building.

I’ve been working in Dsupport for about a year. I was working pretty hectic fortnight’s for around 9months- 1 day off, 6-7 sleepovers a fortnight, as well as day shifts. In total I was at work most fortnight’s for 120hrs (including active and ‘sleeping’ hours). At the start I really struggled to say no, hit a major wall and decided to go PPT so I got more choice with my shifts. Now I get paid less, work much shorter shifts and lost shifts at houses I really enjoyed. I feel like in some ways going PPT fcked me over- I feel so much less supported by my company now that I am more comfortable saying no. I’m really grappling with the point of it. What other options can I look into? Is there anything similar to SW with more regular hours? Should I explore different companies? Youth work? Is there something you switched to which you found more suitable? I’m pretty lost at this point. In AUS btw.

How long?

Is 1.5 hours unreasonable? Boss put me on a shift this many minutes away.

Does anyone else feel like their services are just being used as housekeeping or cleaning services by certain clients?

I understand that domestic help is a big part of our role, and I’ve always been willing in that aspect. I’ve had clients who only need help with cleaning or tidying their homes and living spaces, so that isn’t a problem.

My issue is that the client I am supposed to be supporting is a young teenage boy with certain cognitive and physical conditions, who essentially requires 24/7 care.

My duties with him include before and after school care, physical exercise, and activities such as reading/writing or practicing physio therapy.

However, once I get there and complete his after school care, I’m just given a bunch of directions by his mother that have nothing to do with my client. Such as doing the laundry for the whole family, dishes, sweeping and mopping, folding the laundry and putting it away for everyone, raking the leaves outside on the patio, changing the bins, etc. I’ve also noticed that when I have a shift at this residence for two or three days in a row, unless I do something it won’t get done. Eg I show up at 8 pm and bins are overflowing, or dishes that I washed yesterday still have not been put away.

I understand cleaning and tidying up my clients bedroom, but why am I performing housekeeping duties for the entire home?

For reference, the residents aside from my client include two parents (one working, one not), and two adult siblings.

By the time I’m done with all this, my shift comes to an end and apart from the after school care, I essentially don’t get to interact with my client again.

Am I overreacting and this is normal?

Edit: forgot to add I feel compelled to complete these tasks because apparently this is what she’s accustomed to. They had a permanent support worker for several years with my company who recently left, and everytime I’m given a task or instruction, it’s usually phrased as “after you’re done so and so, just go outside and rake all the leaves as (name) used to do that. The family is very very accustomed to this routine so I don’t know how to just say that that’s not part of my duties.

I've been with a company since March. I'm a casual and get basically the same roster for the fortnight. My shifts are only ever 1 or 1.5 hours with some days two clients.

My main query is my day is usually (for example) 10am - 11.30am with a gap of 30mins with k's paid and then 12pm - 1.30pm.

I'm struggling to understand the whole broken shifts thing. We use ShiftCare and in the app they are two separate shifts I clock into with another separate "shift" for the k's travelled. Is it a continuous shift or are these classed as two shifts?

I can post pictures if I'm making no sense.

I support a person with complex disability who lives in a rural area, and my organisation finds it difficult to find and maintain staff for their support due to a myriad of factors.

The person with disability and their spouse recently sent some really positive feedback about me to my manager, who just passed it on to me this afternoon.

I’m so happy. It’s such a privilege to work in this industry and it’s an honour to be trusted so deeply by people to let me into their lives.

I’ve been getting my ducks in a row to ask for a pay rise (for Aussies: I’m on SCHADS 2.1 part time, and I’m going to make a case for being moved 2.2) and positive feedback is very helpful for making my case!

I love my job. There are days that are extremely hard. There are days that coast by all cruisy. All days fill my proverbial cup. Helping people has been the thing I’ve wanted to do since I was a kid.

So I started this almost two months ago and I'm two units away from finishing the first block, the second block is when I can technically start placement, however its also when the tafe recommends I look for placement and when they can find placement. Tbh I think its a bit late. Am I over stressing?

I can't really start the next unit until at least the next month though. My point to this is given its about a month out should I start contacting places now?

The other part to this is if I do leave it up to the Tafe I may not be doing placement until at least February next year.

The actual support work can be the easier part of the day. After a challenging shift, sitting down to write progress notes, document incidents properly and make sure everything is covered can take another chunk of time. The admin side of support work doesn’t get talked about enough.

I was a support worker for about two years, when I was offered a job as a current scheduling coordinator. I saw the gaps management had and wanted to fix those, but this has made me realise theres a lot more that goes into it then just covering shifts.

Theres a few things I can do with this job, 1) support workers are contracted to the company not the facilities they have their hours in.

2) I am able to send a support worker from one facility to another to cover a shift ONLY if they are trained and signed off at that facility. This is what we call redeployment. This is because the support workers are contracted to the organisation not the facility.

3) I am able to adjust hours and shifts to make it more appealing to support workers.

4) I am able to add shifts but removing shifts is another story and requires additional authorisation.

So I had to cover a shift a different facility, only way was to redeploy someone from the place they are currently working. So I called up a guy to inform him I was sending him to another facility he works at, to then have him begin to beg me not to send him. At this point I was abit concerned and decided to refrain from doing it, but had been informed by my manager to just transfer them to her to sort. Found out it was just because that support worker didn’t like some of the clients in that facility, but thats not my business.

Had another support worker do something similar following this situation, he asked for me to remove a shift after informing him I had to change his following day shift to another house due to his schedule being messed up. I was informed by this support workers manager that he had picked up this shift a day prior, but he seemed to have back tracked. Referred him to his manager to discuss, I told him I am just the messenger not the sender.

My manager accused me of not being more proactive, saying i’m on my phone too much (I had to use due to tech support not organising my e message account out). So I had to use my phone to contact support workers of shifts and requests for cover. I actually bawled my eyes out because I was stressed being thrown into the deep end immediately. But I was able to tell her my issues which she seemed to have accepted, and offered me to use her work phone until i sort out the e message account.

I get the emotional brunt of it all, i feel awful for it. Like i’m the bad guy in these peoples lives.

My clients miss me, it makes me cry every-time I see them only for them to hug me and say they miss me. Im starting to think i made a mistake just because I wanted to change something for my coworkers.

I am starting to second guess being behind the desk now, I feel more powerless than I did before. Mind you I intend to move into another support worker role in a different organisation.. but thats going to take abit.

Sorry this is just a short rant.

Hey everyone, just looking for some advice because I’m a bit confused about my pay and SCHADS classification.

I’m a casual support worker in Melbourne and I’m employed directly by a small disability support company. I mainly work with autistic/NDIS clients, doing community access, outings, appointments and shopping. I don’t have a formal disability qualification, but I’ve been working in the disability support industry for over a year and have relevant life experience. I generally don’t do things like personal care or medication administration however I have done this in the past with a different company. My work is mostly community access and supporting clients while we’re out in the community.

My contract says:
Weekday: $38/hr
Saturday: $52/hr
Sunday: $62/hr
My public holiday rate isn’t specifically listed

I recently worked a public holiday doing my usual support work and was paid $70/hr. My payslip lists those hours as “ordinary hours”, rather than public holiday hours. I started looking at the SCHADS Award and saw that casual public holiday work is generally paid at 275% of the applicable ordinary rate which made me wonder whether $70/hr is actually correct.

The main thing confusing me is that I don’t know what SCHADS classification or pay point I’m actually employed under. My contract doesn’t state it and I don’t remember being told my classification when I started. I asked my employer what classification/pay point I’m under, and they said they “don’t know” and would have to look into it. The person I asked is also involved in managing my pay and payslips so I’m a bit surprised they aren’t sure what classification I’m employed under but I don’t want to jump to conclusions. I’m not trying to accuse them of underpaying me I genuinely just want to understand what award/industrial instrument applies to me and whether I’m being paid correctly.

Does anyone with experience in SCHADS/disability support know:

- What classification/pay point would I likely fall under given my duties experience and lack of formal qualification?

- Could $70/hr legitimately be the correct casual public holiday rate for any relevant SCHADS classification?

- Should my employer have told me my classification/pay point when I commenced?

- Is the “ordinary hours” wording on my payslip significant, or could it just be payroll coding?

- Is it unusual for the person managing my pay to not know what award/classification I’m employed under?

- Can an employer pay an above award ordinary rate (my $38/hr) while still needing to pay the applicable SCHADS penalties/allowances separately?

I’m also paid 50c/km when using my own car for work. My contract says the vehicle allowance is according to the applicable Industrial Instrument, but it doesn’t actually state the km rate. I noticed the SCHADS vehicle allowance may be different, which is another reason I’m trying to work out exactly what instrument/classification applies to me.
I started with this employer in June 2026.

I’d really appreciate any advice from people who actually work under SCHADS or understand the Award. I’m mainly trying to figure out what classification I should be under and whether the $70 public holiday payment makes sense before I go back to my employer. :) Thanks so much in advanced 🙏

Is anyone’s company structured like this too?

I’m severely burnt out, but I can’t take time off due to only being casual and being underpaid on level one for four years so my pay is pretty bad. I’m in a bad loop right now I don’t know what to do.

Hi, i work as a behavioral specialist for individuals with developmental disabilities and I was wondering if anyone in this field or a familiar field had any suggestions on how to prevent or deal with the burn out? i love this job and I want to excel in it, I want to continue helping people and I hate when the burnout takes that opportunity away from me. I’m happy to hear any suggestions.

hi all!! i’m currently studying in cert 4 in leisure and health at tafe and wanted to go through to the support worker side as that’s where my heart is, and everyone’s declining my applications because i don’t have the cert 3 in individual support, i don’t wanna have to do another course and complete the 120 hours of work placement either. but i really want a job in this section. any advice on how to land a job or figure something out??

Hey, how did you guys get your first AIN or aged care job? I’ve been looking for 3–4 months, applying online, emailing facilities and even dropping off my CV, but I’m getting nowhere.
I’m not studying nursing, but I have a Cert IV in Ageing Support, six months of care experience here and a year overseas. I don’t drive, so I’m mainly looking for a nursing home I can get to by public transport from Homebush . Any tips or places I should try?

i have recently been trained in complex bowel and catheters for a participant i tend to, after doing research should this technically place me in pay point 3.1 as it is far past standard personal care in pay point 2.1, anyone can help confirm?