They said he needs an ACAT. That is not quite a thing anymore.

Everyone still says ACAT. Hospital staff say it, GPs say it, the person on the phone at the home says it. You are not wrong to have written it down — but if you search for it you will land on pages describing a system that has since been reorganised.

In December 2024 the separate assessment workforces — ACAT, RAS, and the independent AN-ACC assessors — were brought together into a single assessment system. There is now one assessment workforce using one tool, rather than a different team depending on which door you came through. The word ACAT survives in everyday speech, which is why this page exists. If someone tells you he needs an ACAT, they mean an aged care assessment. Same thing. Nothing has gone wrong.

The assessment is free. It is the gate: government-subsidised aged care — home support, residential care, respite — does not start without one. Much of what else is happening this month is waiting on it, which is why it sits first on this list.

It starts with My Aged Care, on 1800 200 422 or online. If he is already in hospital, do not start there — see the hospital step in this section, because the path is different and faster.

The part almost nobody explains: the assessment decides what care he is eligible for. It does not decide what you pay. Those are two separate processes, run by two different agencies, arriving at two different times. The care assessment is the aged care assessment workforce. The financial side runs through Services Australia. Families routinely sit through the first one waiting for numbers that were never going to come from it, then get blindsided when the second one arrives later.

CareLoop does not calculate fees and never will. But knowing there are two assessments, not one, is the difference between being ambushed and being ready.