Care minutes are delivered shift by shift. But providers only learn their real position when the quarterly reporting is assembled — months after the rosters that caused a gap could have been changed. In 2026 that lag stopped being an inconvenience and became a price: from 1 April 2026, a metropolitan home's care minutes performance directly drives its Care Minutes Supplement (up to $33.41 per bed per day), and every provider must have its Care Minutes Performance Statement externally audited under ASAE 3000.
So we did what the quarterly cycle makes hard: we mapped movement. Using the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing's home-level care minutes performance release, we tracked every residential home across three quarters — Jul–Sep 2025, Oct–Dec 2025 and Jan–Mar 2026 — and looked at who is climbing, who is slipping, and what the funding model rewards.
The sector didn't move in a straight line
The share of homes meeting their care minutes responsibility rose, then eased:
- Jul–Sep 2025: 60.0% of homes met their responsibility
- Oct–Dec 2025: 66.9% — a sharp lift as providers staffed up ahead of the penalties
- Jan–Mar 2026: 63.6% — a slip, in the very quarter that set the first metropolitan supplement outcomes
The timing is the story. Direct-care staffing rose ahead of the 1 April 2026 penalties (StewartBrown reports 61% of homes ran at an operating loss in the six months to December 2025) — yet compliance still gave ground the quarter it mattered most. Meeting the target is not a set-and-forget event; it moves with every roster.
The comebacks: rapid improvement is possible
The most encouraging finding is how fast a provider can turn its position around. Between Oct–Dec 2025 and Jan–Mar 2026, several multi-site providers lifted the share of their homes meeting the target dramatically:
- Eldercare (South Australia, 13 homes) — from 53.8% to 92.3% of homes meeting the target (+38.5 percentage points), the standout comeback among larger providers.
- Australian Nursing Home Foundation (5 homes) — from 40% to 100%.
- UnitingSA (5 homes) — from 40% to 80%.
- Lutheran Homes Group (5 homes) — from 20% to 60%.
A single quarter's swing of 30–60 points is not luck — it's what happens when a provider gets a clear, current line of sight on delivery against target and acts while the roster can still change.
The slips: even big brands fly blind
The other side is sobering. In the same quarter, several large, multi-site operators — some running between 20 and 55 homes — fell by more than 30 percentage points, with the share of their homes meeting the target dropping from the high-80s or 90s into the 40s and 50s.
We're not naming them: these are point-in-time figures from a public dataset, care minutes targets are casemix-adjusted, and a single quarter's dip can have structural causes. But the pattern is the lesson. If a well-resourced national brand can shed 30+ points of compliance across dozens of homes in three months without seeing it coming, the problem isn't effort or funding — it's visibility. Quarterly reporting tells you where you were, not where you are.
The $97m question: over-delivery is a trap too
Under-delivery is the obvious risk. But the funding model punishes imprecision in both directions. In Jan–Mar 2026, most homes delivered above their target — and the supplement caps at $33.41 per bed per day once a home reaches 100%. Every minute beyond that earns nothing.
Sector analysis (Australian Ageing Agenda) puts the national figure at roughly $97 million a quarter spent on care minutes above target that generate no additional supplement. The expert conclusion is the one that matters most for operators: care minutes "need to be measured every day."
An honest caveat. In our read of the data, the biggest over-deliverers are overwhelmingly small rural and remote health services — multi-purpose services where a registered nurse is on-site regardless. Much of that surplus is structural, not waste. But for a metropolitan operator running to a budget, delivering well above target quarter after quarter is real money spent to feel safe — when daily precision would let you be safe and keep it.
The ground moves again on 1 October 2026
From 1 October 2026 the AN-ACC base price rises (industry estimates put it around $306–309, up from $295.64), but the headline percentage hides the real change: class reweighting means two providers receiving the same uplift can land in very different places. Today's optimised classification is tomorrow's exposure. As one sector adviser put it, modelling this now needs "robust systems rather than spreadsheets."
What separates the movers from the sliders
The improvers and the sliders don't differ in how much they care or how much funding they receive. They differ in when they find out. A shortfall caught this week is a roster change. Caught at the quarterly reporting, it's a funding and compliance exposure you can only explain, not fix.
That's the gap Smartta governs. Connect your HR, rostering and timesheet systems — read-only — and Smartta reconciles delivery against your AN-ACC targets daily, flags the homes drifting while the roster can still change, and keeps the evidence behind every reported minute ready for the auditor. You manage the position instead of discovering it.
See your own movement. Our free care-minutes check now shows any provider's quarter-over-quarter trend — the same government data behind this article. Search your provider, see whether you're climbing or slipping, then decide how current you want that picture to be.
Frequently asked questions
What share of homes are meeting care minutes targets in 2026?
Per the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing home-level performance release: 60.0% (Jul–Sep 2025), 66.9% (Oct–Dec 2025), then 63.6% (Jan–Mar 2026) of homes met their care minutes responsibility.
Can a provider improve quickly?
Yes — several multi-site providers lifted the share of homes meeting target by 30–60 percentage points in a single quarter, given the daily visibility to act while rosters could still change.
Why do some homes deliver far above target?
Most homes over-deliver; the largest over-deliverers are small rural/remote health services where an RN is on-site anyway. But an estimated ~$97m a quarter nationally is spent on above-target minutes that earn no extra supplement, because it caps at $33.41/bed/day at 100%.
Sources & method. Home-level performance and targets: Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (home-level care minutes performance release; care minutes targets for individual residential care homes, 2026 releases). Sector financials: StewartBrown Aged Care Financial Performance Survey (1H FY26). Over-delivery estimate and "measured every day": Australian Ageing Agenda. AN-ACC price outlook: Mirus Australia. Figures are point-in-time from public data and are not compliance, funding, or professional advice.