CARE PAYS.

How to Get Paid as a Family Caregiver in Indiana

Yes. Indiana Medicaid can pay certain family caregivers. PathWays permits an authorized adult relative to provide participant-directed Attendant Care under its conditions. Health and Wellness has a parallel route for an authorized adult relative who is not legally responsible for the care recipient. Possibility is not approval: the person receiving care must meet Medicaid financial eligibility and nursing-facility level of care, receive a waiver slot (an opening in approved capacity), and have the paid service written into the approved plan.

The first split is age. Age 60 or older: PathWays for Aging. Age 59 or younger: Health and Wellness. The second split is the work arrangement. Attendant Care records time and authorized tasks; Structured Family Caregiving (SFC) is a live-in arrangement with a daily caregiver stipend through an approved agency.

Find My Best Rate. HomeCare is in private beta. The current form collects state, relationship, coverage, name, email, and ZIP, then records Indiana beta interest. It does not return a provider or rate winner today. Use this page’s official route now; beta members will get early access when Indiana comparisons open.

Find your lane before you call an agency

Home- and community-based services, or HCBS, are Medicaid services delivered at home or in the community instead of a Medicaid-funded institution. The matrix below crosses all three facts that change the Indiana answer: age, relationship, and whether caregiver and care recipient share a home.

LRI means legally responsible individual. Under H&W, that category includes a spouse and a parent of a minor, not a parent caring for an adult child. Paid H&W Attendant Care furnished by all LRIs combined is capped at 40 reimbursable hours per week per participant. A separate H&W cap applies to each paid non-LRI relative or legal guardian across Attendant Care, Home and Community Assistance, and Skilled Respite; that cap does not reduce the participant’s total services from other workers.

Choose time-based care or live-in care

Attendant Care: authorized time, tasks, and a worker budget

Indiana’s INCharge option lets eligible PathWays and H&W participants self-direct Attendant Care. The participant finds, hires, pays, and manages the worker. A case manager or PathWays service coordinator supports the plan, while Financial Management Services (FMS) handles employment and payroll administration; Indiana’s contracted FMS vendor is Palco.

Attendant Care is time-based, but that does not establish one statewide worker wage. The person-centered service plan, the approved list and amount of supports, sets the self-directed service and budget; the participant chooses a wage within a permitted range. Indiana’s live page does not publish the range endpoints, so confirm them with the case manager or PathWays service coordinator and Palco before choosing the model.

Structured Family Caregiving: one home, one agency, one daily unit

Under both waivers, Structured Family Caregiving, or SFC, requires the principal caregiver and care recipient to live together. The approved agency is the Medicaid provider, while the principal caregiver receives a per-diem stipend through the agency arrangement.

Both waivers use three SFC levels based on an Adult Family Care/Structured Family Care Level of Service assessment completed at least annually. Attendant Care and Home and Community Assistance cannot be separately stacked on top of SFC for the same participant.

Indiana publishes the agency rate, not your exact cash stipend

The official Indiana Health Coverage Programs, or IHCP, Professional Fee Schedule was updated August 11, 2026. Its rates apply to fee-for-service claims and serve as minimum rates for Indiana Medicaid managed care plans. The schedule lists these daily Medicaid provider reimbursement rates, not caregiver take-home pay:

Open the official IHCP fee schedule.

Indiana also requires an SFC provider to use at least 60% of the daily reimbursement rate for caregiver stipends and direct-care compensation. That percentage is not automatically a 60% cash stipend: the official policy allows benefits and transportation expenses to count toward the pass-through. The agency’s written offer is where the caregiver’s actual cash amount and terms become clear.

Make every SFC agency answer the same questions

• What is the caregiver’s gross cash stipend at the assessed SFC level?
• Which benefits or transportation costs count toward the 60% pass-through?
• How often is the caregiver paid, and what deductions or withholding appear?
• What training, background checks, documents, and unpaid onboarding steps are required?
• Who provides backup care, and does backup care change the stipend?
• What happens to caregiver compensation when the SFC level changes?
• What date can authorized, payable care begin?
• Will the agency put every answer in writing before enrollment?

An agency should have to show its math. HomeCare is building the Indiana comparison, but the current private-beta form records interest rather than producing a winner.

Go from application to authorized pay in seven steps

1. Apply for Indiana Medicaid. Use the official Indiana Medicaid member page to reach the FSSA Benefits Portal. Medicaid coverage is one gate; it is not yet a waiver slot or paid-care authorization.
2. Start the correct waiver intake. For H&W, Indiana directs applicants to the local Area Agency on Aging (AAA) at 800-713-9023. For either age lane, ask for the nursing-facility level-of-care process rather than starting with an SFC sales form.
3. Complete the functional assessment. Indiana’s Level of Care Assessment Representative (LCAR) is Maximus. LCAR conducts the nursing-facility level-of-care assessment for new PathWays and H&W applicants; an individual or assisting AAA can request it.
4. Confirm the waiver-list record. Indiana issues invitations as approved capacity remains. Use the current FSSA waitlist page and dashboard instructions to confirm placement and keep contact information current. Indiana says there is no static numbered place in line.
5. Send the invitation response to the right owner within 30 days. An H&W invitee responds to the AAA. A PathWays invitee responds to the assigned managed care entity (MCE), meaning the PathWays health plan.
6. Finish activation within 180 days of the invitation. The current sample letters use the same completion window for H&W and PathWays and say an incomplete invitation can be rescinded. Do not substitute that window for the shorter 30-day response deadline.
7. Authorize the service, then onboard the caregiver. SFC must be in the person-centered service plan before it is provided and billed under PathWays or H&W. For self-direction, complete FMS employment and payroll setup. For SFC, complete the approved agency’s caregiver setup. PathWays members can use the official PathWays contacts to identify Anthem, Humana, or UnitedHealthcare and call 877-284-9294 for plan-selection help.

The waitlists are current, and they are moving targets

Verified August 25, 2026: FSSA’s page, last updated August 17, reports 11,779 people on the PathWays Medicaid Waiver waiting list and 6,836 on the H&W waiting list, both labeled as of August 2026. The overall PathWays managed-care program is not waitlisted; the PathWays HCBS Waiver is. Recheck the official page within seven days of publication.

While waiting:

• Keep contact information current and check the dashboard; a fluid list cannot provide a fixed place or promised date.
• Ask the AAA about available community resources. Indiana’s H&W waiting checklist also points families to Indiana 211 for referrals.
• Ask the AAA about the Family Caregiver Program only for the supports its official page lists: caregiver counseling or training, respite, information and access assistance, and limited supplemental services. Eligibility depends on the caregiver and care recipient’s age and circumstances.
• Collect documents and agency questions now, so an invitation does not start a scramble.

Two delays to prevent

Starting with an agency instead of the state process. Complete steps 1 through 6 before treating an agency quote as payable work. Use the authorized service model and start date, not a sales-screen result, as the basis for comparing offers.

Leaving the invitation unopened. On the day it arrives, identify the response owner and put both printed deadlines on the calendar. Return the response form to the destination named in the actual letter, then keep every eligibility and planning appointment.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is a parent of a minor treated the same as a parent of an adult?

No. H&W treats a parent of a minor as a legally responsible individual, so that parent cannot provide participant-directed Attendant Care. The parent may provide SFC under the extraordinary-care and approved-agency conditions, or agency Attendant Care under the narrower extraordinary intensive-nursing-care conditions. A parent caring for an adult is a non-LRI relative and may provide participant-directed Attendant Care when authorized and qualified.

What exact wage can a self-directed Attendant Care worker receive?

The current official page does not publish one statewide wage or the range endpoints. It says the participant uses the approved self-directed budget to choose worker wages within a permitted range. Ask the case manager or PathWays service coordinator and Palco to confirm the current range, authorized units, and proposed wage before the worker enrolls.

When can caregiver payment begin, and is earlier care retroactive?

Get the authorized start date in writing before counting on payment. For SFC, the verified rule is that the service must appear in the approved person-centered plan before it is provided and billed. For self-direction, the approved plan establishes services and budget, and FMS handles employment and payroll setup. This research did not establish a general right to retroactive family-caregiver pay, so ask the case manager, MCE or FMS about the individual effective date before work starts.

What should I gather before the Medicaid and waiver calls?

Start with household identity and financial information. Indiana’s current application page lists names and birth dates, Social Security numbers, income information, and current or recent benefit information. The AAA or benefits worker may then identify additional financial, medical, guardianship, or authorized-representative documents needed for the specific case.

Are Indiana Medicaid caregiver payments taxable or counted by benefit programs?

Do not assume one answer covers every payment or program. The IRS says certain Medicaid waiver payments for care provided in the individual caregiver’s home can qualify as difficulty-of-care payments excluded from federal gross income. This article does not use that narrow federal rule to predict how an Indiana agency stipend affects SSI, SNAP, Medicaid, housing, or another benefit. Get the payment description and tax form from the agency or FMS, then confirm treatment with the IRS or a qualified tax professional and each benefit administrator.

Does Medicare pay for this ongoing family care?

Medicare is not the Indiana waiver-pay route described here. Medicare’s official long-term-care page says it does not pay for long-term custodial care such as ongoing help with activities of daily living. Check Medicaid waiver eligibility separately rather than treating Medicare coverage as caregiver-pay approval.

Put your Indiana case on the beta list

Bring the facts that actually change the answer: recipient age, relationship, Medicaid coverage, ZIP, shared residence, and the care model you are considering. Find My Best Rate records your state, relationship, coverage, contact details, ZIP, and private-beta interest. It does not return a provider winner today.

After submitting, use the official Indiana contacts and checklist above while HomeCare builds the provider comparison. Beta members get early access when Indiana comparisons open.