Short-Term Accommodation (STA) Under the NDIS Explained

Short-term accommodation (STA) gives NDIS participants time away from their usual care arrangements while their primary informal carers take a break. As of 20 October 2025, the NDIS officially renamed it short-term respite (STR), and the updated guideline narrowed who can use it and what it's for. You can still access up to 28 days a year, in blocks of up to 14 days at a time, but the funding no longer covers holidays, extras, or skill-building trial stays the way older guidance once suggested.

Key Takeaways

• STA and short-term respite (STR) are the same support, the NDIS renamed it on 20 October 2025, and most content online still hasn't caught up.
• You can generally access it if you live with, or get daily drop-in support from, an informal carer providing more than 6 hours a day of disability-related assistance.
• Funding covers standard accommodation and support during the stay, not holidays, cruises, theme parks, or travel extras.
• It's no longer positioned for skill-building or "trial stays", that was the old STA framing and it's not how the current guideline describes the support.
• Care Steps Australia doesn't currently provide STA/STR accommodation directly, but if your family also needs clinical or nursing support around a respite stay, that's exactly where we can help. Get in touch and we'll talk through your situation.

Table of Contents

• It Used to Be Called STA. Now It's Short-Term Respite.
• What Short-Term Respite Actually Is
• Who Can Access It Now
• What It Covers, and What It Doesn't Anymore
• How Much You Can Access
• Isn't This the Same as a Trial Stay or Building Independence?
• What This Means If You Also Need Clinical or Nursing Support
• For Punchbowl & Sydney South West Families
• Frequently Asked Questions

It Used to Be Called STA. Now It's Short-Term Respite. 

On 20 October 2025, the NDIA officially updated how it describes this support, moving from "short-term accommodation" to "short-term respite." According to the NDIS's own announcement, the change reflects a shift in focus: away from the accommodation itself and toward the actual purpose of the support, giving a participant's usual informal carers, family, or friends a genuine break from their caring role.

The NDIA says it made this change after speaking directly with participants, families, and carers, most of whom felt "short-term respite" better reflected the value of informal support relationships. Alongside the name change, the NDIA also updated its official guideline, which narrows how the support can be used, covered in detail below.

Most content still online, including several well-established provider guides, hasn't been updated to reflect this. If you're researching this support right now, in August 2026, it's worth knowing both names: "STA" is still how most people search and how most legacy content refers to it, but "short-term respite" is the current, official term, and the one that reflects the current rules.

What Short-Term Respite Actually Is 

According to the NDIS's own current guidance, short-term respite is a support that gives you time apart from your usual care arrangements, whether that's family, friends, or a carer, while those people take a short break from their caring role. It's designed to help them keep caring for you afterward, not to replace your usual care long-term.

The support focuses on covering what you actually need during that time away: help with everyday activities like showering, cooking, and toileting, alongside the accommodation itself.

Who Can Access It Now 

The narrowed 2025/26 guideline is specific about who this support is for. You may be able to get short-term respite funding if:

This is narrower than how STA was sometimes described in the past. If you're a participant living in Supported Independent Living (SIL), your daily support is already funded through that arrangement, so short-term respite generally isn't the relevant support for you.

If you're not sure whether your situation fits, your my NDIS contact can talk it through with you directly, this is genuinely worth confirming before you plan around it.

What It Covers, and What It Doesn't Anymore 

Short-term respite funding can be used for:

• Support to help with everyday activities, like showering, cooking, and toileting
• Standard accommodation, such as a hotel, motel, short-stay rental, cabin, cottage, hostel, or respite accommodation
• Support to stay in your own home, or a homestay arrangement, if you usually need overnight support

You should generally use this funding within your home state or territory. The NDIS may fund it outside your home state if you live in a remote area.

What it explicitly can't be used for, per the current NDIS guidance, includes:

• Cruises, holiday packages, holiday accommodation, and airfares
• Passports, visas, or travel and vehicle insurance
• Accommodation or travel expenses for family members or support workers accompanying you on holiday
• Theme parks, music, theatre, cinema, sporting events, and conferences
• Food or meals

This is a meaningful clarification worth knowing if you've seen older content describing STA as covering "activities" more broadly, the current guideline is considerably more specific about what counts as a legitimate use of the funding.

How Much You Can Access

Short-term respite is generally funded for up to 28 days per year. You can use it flexibly, for example, as one block of up to 14 consecutive days, or spread across the year, like one weekend a month.

It's usually paid for under your Core Supports budget, so you'll need to make sure your funding lasts across the whole length of your plan, unless there's an exception, top-ups generally don't happen until your next plan renewal. If your current plan doesn't include short-term respite funding and your situation has changed, you can ask to change your plan.

Isn't This the Same as a Trial Stay or Building Independence?

Not under the current guideline. Some older content, including guides still live from before the October 2025 update, describes STA as a way to try new routines, build independence, or trial a stay away from home ahead of a future move. That framing was accurate under the previous version of the guideline.

Under the current short-term respite guideline, the emphasis has shifted specifically to giving informal carers a genuine break, not skill-building or trialling future accommodation options. If your goal is specifically to build independent living skills or explore longer-term accommodation options, that's a different conversation worth having directly with your Local Area Coordinator or support coordinator, since it may point toward different supports, like Medium Term Accommodation or Supported Independent Living, that are designed for that purpose.

What This Means If You Also Need Clinical or Nursing Support 

Short-term respite funding covers accommodation and general everyday support during the stay, but it isn't designed to replace ongoing clinical care for participants with more complex health needs. If you or a family member need wound care, medication management, or monitoring for a chronic condition during or around a respite stay, that typically calls for registered or enrolled nursing support rather than general personal care.

This is genuinely worth planning for. If a respite stay is coming up and clinical needs are part of the picture, it's worth speaking with both your respite provider and a nursing support provider ahead of time so nothing falls through the gap. Care Steps Australia doesn't provide short-term respite accommodation directly, but our community nursing care for high needs is exactly the kind of support that can sit alongside a respite arrangement when clinical needs are involved. If you'd like to talk through how that could work for your situation, get in touch.

For Punchbowl & Sydney South West Families 

Families across Punchbowl, Bankstown, and the wider Canterbury-Bankstown area are navigating this rename at the same time as everything else that comes with an NDIS plan, and it's a genuinely confusing moment for a support that just changed its name and its rules within the same year.

If English isn't your first language, this is worth raising early with whoever is helping you plan or book respite, free interpreter support is available through TIS National on 131 450. Care Steps Australia works with families across a wide range of language and cultural backgrounds, and if your family's situation involves both a respite stay and ongoing clinical needs, we're glad to help you think through how the pieces fit together.

About This Guide

This guide was written by Merina Suwal, Director and Clinical Services Specialist at Care Steps Australia, who brings more than 10 years of clinical nursing experience across residential aged care and home care settings. This guide draws directly on current NDIS guidance published by the National Disability Insurance Agency, including its official 20 October 2025 update. Last updated August 13, 2026.

Get in Touch

Care Steps Australia 48 Lancaster Avenue, Punchbowl, NSW 2196 Phone: (02) 8201 3100 Email: info@carestepsaustralia.com.au

Planning a respite stay and want to talk through what support your family might also need? Contact Care Steps Australia or explore the full range of NDIS supports we provide across Punchbowl and Sydney's south west.