What does Support at Home cost in 2026?

Support at Home is the government program that funds ongoing help at home for older Australians. It replaced the Home Care Package program on 1 November 2025, and it works differently enough that advice written for the old system can now mislead. Here is how the money actually flows in 2026.

Your budget: 8 classification levels

After an assessment arranged through My Aged Care, you are assigned one of 8 classification levels, each with a quarterly budget. Based on the 2025-26 figures providers publish in their own schedules, those budgets run from about $2,700 a quarter at level 1 to about $19,500 a quarter at level 8, roughly $11,000 to $78,000 a year. Budgets are indexed in March and September. People transitioned from a Home Care Package kept an equivalent level of funding.

What you contribute depends on the service type

Services fall into three groups, each with its own contribution rules:

• Clinical care (nursing, care management, allied health treatment): the government pays 100%. You contribute nothing, whatever your means.
• Independence services (personal care, social support, respite, transport): full pensioners contribute 5%, part pensioners and Commonwealth Seniors Health Card holders between 5% and 50%, and self funded retirees without a card 50%.
• Everyday living (cleaning, gardening, meals, home maintenance): full pensioners contribute 17.5%, rising with means to 80% for self funded retirees without a card.

Services Australia sets your exact contribution through a means assessment; providers must collect it and cannot waive it. A lifetime cap, around $130,000 and indexed, limits total non-clinical contributions across your time in aged care.

What providers charge

Providers set their own prices, and the differences are large. Among providers serving Canberra, published weekday personal care rates currently range from around $52 to $225 an hour, with many between $100 and $130. Registered nurse visits range even more widely. Care management is commonly charged at 10% of your quarterly budget, which the government deducts for that purpose. From 1 July 2026 the government began phasing in price caps on Support at Home services.

Watch for the details that change your effective price: evening, weekend and public holiday surcharges; minimum visit lengths; travel charges per kilometre; and administration fees of around 10% when a provider processes invoices for workers you choose yourself. Every fee on Glidance's provider listings comes from the provider's own published schedule with a source link, so you can compare like for like, and our home care in Canberra page summarises the current market.