In the January to March 2026 quarter, 1,629 of the 2,560 residential aged care homes that reported care minutes (63.63%) met both their total care minutes and registered nurse (RN) care minutes targets. The other 931 missed at least one. For a multi-site group, each of those results belongs to a single home, measured against that home’s own targets, and a group-level figure can hide the home that fell short.
The figures come from the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’s care minutes dashboard, which reports results from the Quarterly Financial Report (QFR). This post sets out what the quarter shows, why the home is the unit that matters, and what a board can ask before the current quarter closes.
How many homes met their care minutes targets in January to March 2026?
Of the 2,560 homes reporting, 1,800 (70.31%) met their total care minutes target and 2,083 (81.37%) met their RN target. Meeting both is a smaller group of 1,629 homes. Another 625 homes (24.41%) met one target and missed the other, and 306 (11.95%) met neither.
Location adds a further layer. In metropolitan areas, classified as Modified Monash Model category 1 (MM1), 65.96% of the 1,645 reporting homes met both targets in the quarter.
Why can a group meet care minutes while one home falls short?
The care minutes requirement is based on a sector-wide average of 215 minutes of care per resident per day, including 44 minutes of direct RN care. That average is the starting point, not the test. Each residential care home has its own targets, based on its residents’ care needs, and those targets are calculated every quarter.
For a group, no two homes carry the same target. Picture five homes reporting to one board. Four deliver above their targets and one sits below one of its targets for the whole quarter. The combined figure looks healthy because the four lift it, and the fifth home does not appear unless someone asks for it by name.
Targets also move. A home can keep the same roster from one quarter to the next and still go from meeting its targets to missing them if its residents’ care needs change.
Why is meeting one target not enough?
Total and RN targets are met or missed separately. Of the 625 homes that met one target only, 454 met their RN target but missed total minutes, and 171 met total minutes but missed their RN target. A report that shows one combined measure will present either kind of home as on track.
What changed for care minutes in 2026?
Since April 2026, part of the care funding for non-specialised metropolitan (MM1) homes has been paid through a care minutes supplement that depends on each home’s care minutes performance. Each payment quarter uses the performance quarter that began six months earlier: October to December 2025 set April to June 2026, and January to March 2026 sets July to September 2026.
From the 2025-26 Aged Care Financial Report, every residential aged care provider must also prepare and submit a Care Minutes Performance Statement, which must be externally audited. It is prepared after the quarters it describes have closed. A board seeing home-level results for the first time at that point is reviewing quarters it can no longer change.
Where does the board’s accountability sit under the Quality Standards?
Standard 2 (The Organisation) of the Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards places these outcomes with the governing body. Outcome 2.8 (Workforce planning) requires the provider to understand and manage its workforce needs, and its actions include meeting minimum care requirements, such as a minimum average of direct care minutes and a registered nurse on-site and on duty at all times. Outcome 2.9 (Human resource management) has actions that include deploying the number and mix of workers needed for safe and quality services. Outcome 2.3 makes the governing body accountable for oversight of all operations, supported by a quality system that lets it monitor performance.
The department also provides QFR data on direct care minutes and 24/7 RN reporting to the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission (ACQSC) to support its regulatory work, and publishes home-level care minutes performance every quarter. Care minutes are visible outside the organisation at home level, whether or not they are visible inside it at that level.
What should a multi-site board ask before the quarter closes?
Four changes to what the board asks for make each home visible again. Lead care minutes reporting with each home against its own targets and show the group figure last. Report total and RN minutes as two lines for every home. Set a fixed mid-quarter point when the executive reviews every home and reports exceptions. Agree in advance who owns the response when a home tracks below target.
Then table one question at the next board meeting: which of our homes is below its care minutes targets this quarter, and how do we know today rather than after the quarter closes?
The Site Behind the Average is Acredia’s eight-page briefing for multi-site boards. It covers the January to March 2026 results, the governing body’s obligations, and a six-question register to test home-level visibility.
Download my copy of The Site Behind the Average
Prefer to talk it through? Book 20 minutes on my board’s view of site-level care minutes
Sources: Department of Health, Disability and Ageing, Care minutes in residential aged care dashboard, January–March 2026 quarter, including the Modified Monash location table; Home-level care minutes performance in residential aged care; Care minutes and 24/7 registered nurse responsibility; Care minutes funding changes April 2026; Care minutes funding policy, April 2026 fact sheet (September 2026) (health.gov.au). Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards, Standard 2. Published by Acredia Insights. The 454 and 171 figures are derived from the published counts of homes meeting each target, less homes meeting both.
