2026 Innovation Round

Outcomes and feedback

 

 

 

 

2026 Innovation Round outcomes

Following a competitive assessment process, the FCIF Board awarded ten 2026 Innovation grants.

This year’s Innovation grantees will drive innovation in financial counselling by leveraging technology to improve client intake, triage, case management, document exchange and client retention, and pioneer new approaches to better serve First Nations clients, people experiencing family violence, and those living in regional communities.

We appreciate the time and effort that goes into every grant application, and have summarised key feedback to help inform future applications.

Grant recipients

Anglicare NSW South, NSW West & ACT 

Anglicare will pilot a client engagement system that brings booking, reminders, follow-up, safety and welfare communication, and feedback evaluation into one streamlined workflow across all stages of financial counselling. Integrating with Outlook, it enables controlled booking, automated reminders, and consistent follow-up to improve booking access, attendance, and post-referral utilisation.

Anglicare WA

Anglicare WA will develop, trial and integrate a digital intake and triage decision tree model within our existing Financial Wellbeing HUB. It will support safe self-enrolment, clearer client journeys through complexity grading, improving intake efficiency, financial counsellor workload management and enhanced client outcomes across financial counselling services. 

Child and Family Services Ballarat 

Cafs will trial a secure client document upload portal enabling clients to submit documents and complete actions between appointments. By shifting administrative tasks outside sessions, the project will reduce workload, increase practitioner capacity, and enable timelier access to financial counselling for people experiencing financial hardship.

EACH

Each will scope and design the consent and legal frameworks, user workflows, and regulatory and technical considerations for a Verified Evidence and Records Access Platform (VERA). VERA will provide Financial Counsellors with timely and comprehensive access to client-consented records from government corporate registers, significantly improving administrative efficiency and counselling capacity.

Financial Counselling Victoria

FCVic will pilot a structured transition process for financial counselling agencies upgrading Client Management Systems. The project will test migration tools, data standards and implementation supports to reduce administrative burden, improve data quality and enable more efficient service delivery, informed by sector-wide digital transformation insights.

Financial Rights Legal Centre

Scope, pilot and evaluate an AI enabled integration between telephone and CRM systems to automate case notes and summaries from voice-to-text for the National Debt Helpline, while developing transferable privacy, ethical and technical standards and policy templates for adoption across the financial counselling sector.

Good Shepherd Australia New Zealand

This project will improve financial counselling efficiency and outcomes by reducing early client disengagement. It will embed lived experience insights for approaches to increase client retention and case completion, producing a real-world based, fit for purpose sector wide practice guide to support consistent adoption, scale and measurable service effectiveness.

Money Mob Talkabout

MoneyMob will prototype an Aṉangu-led stepped financial counselling system that introduces structured triage and workflow pathways to match clients to the right level of support earlier. The model will reduce unnecessary demand for intensive casework, improve service efficiency, and create a scalable service architecture for the financial counselling sector.

Northern Rivers Community Gateway

Community Gateway will pilot three digital financial counselling access booths in community health settings across Clarence Valley, Tweed Shire and Richmond Valley. Booths provide secure, private spaces for clients to connect with financial counsellors via video, reducing travel time, increasing financial counsellor capacity and creating a scalable regional delivery model.

Women's Legal Service WA

Women’s Legal Service WA (WLSWA) will develop a concise, trauma‑informed FDSV screening tool tailored for financial counsellors. Designed for time‑poor, non‑specialist services, the tool will enable safe disclosure, assess perpetrator risk, support appropriate referrals to specialist services, and integrate financial counselling practice within professional and legal limitations.

Advisory panel

The Innovation Advisory Panel  reviews applications during our assessment process

Feedback

 

What made a compelling project? 

 

A clear service delivery problem

Strong applications clearly defined the service delivery problem, explained who was affected and provided evidence of its scale. They avoided relying on broad assumptions and showed why the proposed solution was a logical response to the problem.

A direct efficiency benefit

Compelling proposals demonstrated how the project could increase financial counselling services to assist more people, reduce avoidable administration, shorten delays or make better use of financial counsellor capacity. Projects with worthwhile objectives were less competitive where the link to service delivery efficiency was indirect or unclear.

Genuine originality

The strongest applications explained what was new about the proposed approach and how it differed from existing tools, resources or ordinary operational improvement. Adapting an established approach could still be innovative, but applicants needed to explain what was being tested and why the adaptation was meaningful in financial counselling.

Sector-wide benefit

Strong applications looked beyond the needs of one organisation. They explained how the project, evidence or learning could be used by other financial counselling services, including organisations with different systems, sizes and operating contexts.

Confirmed partnerships and delivery arrangements

Applications were more persuasive where key partners, technology providers and participating services had confirmed their involvement. Letters of support were most useful when they set out a partner’s role, contribution and commitment rather than providing general endorsement.

A realistic plan and budget

Compelling applications had a clear work plan, realistic milestones, a coherent budget and measurable outcomes. They identified key risks, including privacy, regulatory, technology, staffing and implementation risks, and explained how these would be managed.

A strong approach to testing and evaluation

Successful proposals included baseline information and a practical method for determining whether the idea worked. Evaluation plans were stronger where they specified the measures, sample, data sources and decision points that would be used.

  
  

Why were projects unsuccessful?

 

Ineligible applicants

A small number of EOIs were submitted by organisations that were not currently providing financial counselling services and were therefore ineligible to apply under the Grant Guidelines.

Ineligible activities

A number of EOIs primarily sought funding for activities that were ineligible under the Grant Guidelines, including:

• employing financial counsellors, financial capability workers or administrative/support staff to deliver additional services

• activities unrelated to financial counselling service delivery

• standalone financial literacy or financial education initiatives.

Projects that proposed a different location, client group or delivery setting were still considered additional service delivery where the main activity was employing staff to provide more services.

Limited originality or differentiation

Some EOIs described interesting projects but did not clearly explain what was new about the proposed approach or how it differed from existing tools, resources or service delivery models. Other proposals addressed similar issues to stronger EOIs but did not demonstrate a sufficiently distinct solution or broader sector benefit.

Some full applications were viewed as a useful operational improvement rather than a sufficiently new solution. Others overlapped with existing sector resources, previously funded work or stronger applications addressing similar issues in the same round

Deliverability risk

Some EOIs did not progress because the organisation did not demonstrate sufficient capacity, resources or financial stability to deliver the project. Innovation funding can support testing and development, but applicants must still show that they have the governance, staffing and operational capability needed to manage the work.

Some applications presented material financial or implementation risks. Concerns included unclear or fragmented budgets, ambitious staffing plans and work programs, uncertain technology scope and insufficient planning for privacy, regulation or technical integration.

Some projects depended on external partners or participating services that had not confirmed their involvement by the full application stage. This reduced confidence in both deliverability and sector-wide benefit.

Insufficient detail 

While the EOI was intentionally brief, some proposals were too broad or unclear to assess. Stronger EOIs clearly described the proposed solution, how it would work and why it was likely to improve financial counselling service delivery.

Applications were less competitive where the scale of the problem was not supported by baseline data, claimed time savings were not substantiated, or the evaluation approach did not identify a suitable sample, comparison or measure of success.

Limited sector-wide benefits

Technology proposals were less compelling where benefits depended on a particular system, proprietary methodology or commercial provider without a clear plan for broader access. Stronger applications addressed intellectual property, licensing, ongoing costs and whether smaller services could realistically adopt the solution.