April 2006 - Issue 18

Table of contents:

DS NMDS Project Officers

Following the successes of the project officers employed under the DSQ Client Capacity Building Project in 2004-05, the department has been provided with funding to implement the project on a recurrent basis. DSQ is currently recruiting four project officers, three of which will be located in Brisbane and one will be located in Townsville.

The role of the project officers will be to provide hands-on support and training to agency staff to help them report high quality and timely data. The project officers will be available to visit staff in both DSQ and non-government agencies. The project officers will focus on agencies that have high support needs.

The project officers will be working closely with DSQ Community Resource Officers to ensure that service type outlets are set up and accurately reflected in General Service Agreements (GSAs).

After an initial period of intensive training and planning, DS NMDS project officers are expected to be on the job from late May.

If you are interested in receiving assistance from a project officer, please contact the Helpline.

Compliance statistics - 2005-06

As at 4 April 2006, 91.8% of DSQ outlets had lodged NMDS data for the first quarter and 92.3% had lodged data for the second quarter. 80.1% of NGO outlets had lodged data for the first quarter and 77.4% had lodged data for the second quarter.

Thanks to all outlets who have already lodged data. Outlets that have not lodged first and/or second quarter data are encouraged to do so as soon as possible.

DS NMDS Web page changes

Over the next few months, changes will occur to the DS NMDS Web page. These changes are being made to bring the pages into line with Government standard for documentation and will include updates to:

  • the NMDS data collection materials
  • ODC documentation
  • the self paced training materials.

A news article will be posted to ODC when these changes have been made. Anything that is no longer relevant will be removed, however, if you still require this documentation contact the Helpline and we will arrange for a copy to be sent to you.

If you have any queries, please contact the Helpline.

Helpline call statistics

Requests for Help 2005-2006

July 2005 to March 2006

  • Phone: 1291
  • Email: 345
  • Total: 1636

Monthly average

  • Phone: 143
  • Email: 38
  • Total: 181

Diary dates

April 2006

  • Deadline for third quarter data lodgement: 30 April 2006

Online data Collection (ODC) quarterly reporting checklist

ODC now has a feature that allows you to check if your service type outlet(s) are compliant with NMDS reporting requirements. To access this feature:

  • login to ODC
  • select the 'Reports' link
  • select the 'Quarterly reporting checklist' link

At this screen:

  • select the outlets you wish to check
  • select the quarter and year
  • click on 'Run Report'

ODC will then display a screen with the following items for each outlet you select:

  • Service Type Outlet ID
  • Service Type Outlet Name
  • Service Type
  • What you need to do

The section titled 'What you need to do' is the most important. It outlines the steps you need to take to ensure compliance for your selected outlets. There may be multiple tasks for you to complete to ensure compliance, and you will need to re-run the 'Quarterly reporting checklist' report after performing these tasks to display any other issues that may appear.

If you see the message 'Nothing more to do' for any outlet, then that outlet is compliant for the selected quarter and/or year.

You can run this report at any time. Contact the DS NMDS Helpline if you have any queries with this new ODC feature.

DS NMDS paper users

If your agency lodges DS NMDS data on paper, there is a way to reduce your workload. If you have an existing (i.e. long-term) service user, you only need to send pages 1,7 and 8 of the service user (yellow) form. However, if you are recording details of a new service user, you must send all eight pages of the service user form.

You still need to send the service type outlet (green) form for each of your service type outlets.

Contact the DS NMDS Helpline if you have any queries.

ODC issues and updates - you can help refine ODC

ODC is constantly being updated in response to your phone calls and emails about emerging issues within ODC and the collection.

Our software developers make changes to ODC based on these emerging issues. DSQ thoroughly test these changes before ODC is updated, however, we are unable to test all combinations of service type outlet data, service user data and services received data.

If you discover an issue within ODC, please report it to the Helpline or send an email to the DS NMDS Team at the email address below.

Your help in making ODC a better software package is highly valued.

DS NMDS help available

If you have a query and cannot find the answer after checking the DS NMDS Resource Kit, either call the Helpline or send an email to us.

Remember, your call is important, so if the Helpline is busy, leave a message on the voicemail and we will respond at the first opportunity.