12 September 2023
The Australian Government has increased funding for the Workforce Incentive Program (WIP) – Practice Stream. This aims to help more patients access multidisciplinary team-based care in general practices.
The changes to the WIP – Practice Stream include:
- increasing the maximum incentive amount from $125,000 to $130,000 per practice, per year before rural loading is applied
- decreasing Standardised Whole Patient Equivalent (SWPE) for the maximum incentive from 5,000 to 4,000 so more practices can access the maximum payment
- increasing the payment by up to 30 per cent with the amount based on the practice SWPE, health professional types and average hours worked
Practices do not need to do anything. Services Australia made the updates with the first increased payments which occurred in August 2023.