What is a Higher Everyday Living Fee?
A Higher Everyday Living Fee, or HELF, is a charge a residential aged care home can offer residents for services that go beyond the standard offer every resident already receives. It replaced the old Extra Service and Additional Service fees when the Aged Care Act 2024 commenced on 1 November 2025. Offering HELF is optional for the home. Taking it up is optional for the resident. Legacy arrangements under the old fees must transition to HELF or cease by 31 October 2026.
How does HELF differ from the fees it replaced?
The old fees were familiar but loosely governed. HELF sits inside a rights-based framework with specific consent, disclosure, and review requirements that the previous instruments did not carry. A provider cannot assume that a service it charged for under Additional Services is automatically chargeable under HELF. The agreement structure, the disclosure obligations, and the ongoing review requirements are all new.
What is the most common mistake providers are making?
Charging residents for services they were already receiving at no cost before 1 November 2025. The Department’s guidance has always said this is not permitted for those residents. The Minister announced in September 2026 that this will be written into the Aged Care Rules themselves, making it law rather than guidance.
What should a provider check before launching or continuing a HELF programme?
Four things at minimum. First, whether you have a documented record of what each pre-November resident was receiving free, since that determines what you can and cannot charge them. Second, whether your billing distinguishes between resident cohorts (pre-November protected, transitioning, and post-Act). Third, whether each charge can be traced to a record of the service actually being delivered. Fourth, whether HELF agreements are reviewed when a resident’s care needs change, not just on an annual cycle.
What happens if a resident’s circumstances change after they signed?
The Aged Care Rules require HELF to be optional and appropriate. If a resident can no longer use a service they are paying for, whether because of a change in mobility, cognition, dietary needs, or a hospital admission, continuing to charge is not defensible. The home should review the agreement, adjust or cancel the affected services, and have that conversation with the resident or family before the next billing cycle.
Can a provider bundle HELF services?
Yes, but a bundle may cost no more than the sum of its standalone items, and every item in the bundle must also be available separately. A resident should not be paying for a service inside a bundle that they cannot use and did not ask for.
What does the Commission expect a provider to be able to show?
For any resident with a HELF charge, the ACQSC expects the provider to be able to produce: the signed agreement, the pre-agreement disclosure, the review record, and evidence the service was delivered. If that information is in a filing cabinet rather than a retrievable system, the response time during an assessment visit is unlikely to be adequate. Most of these checks are only hard because the answers live in different places: care plans, service logs, signed agreements, and a billing system that was never asked to reconcile them.
For the full ten-question compliance scorecard, download the Acredia Insights governance guide.
