This Fast Track Solution is designed to assist healthcare practices in assessing whether their proposed practitioner engagement arrangements appropriately align with the way the clinic intends to operate in practice. It is relevant for practices:

• engaging practitioners as employees or under a contractor or practitioner services model;

• reviewing or redesigning their operational or practitioner engagement framework;

• concerned about potential employment, superannuation or payroll tax risk exposure; or

• seeking greater clarity regarding the most appropriate legal framework for practitioner engagement arrangements.

Please note that this Fast Track Solution provides preliminary structuring and operational advice only and does not include drafting or review of practitioner agreements or other legal documentation.

As part of this Fast Track Solution, we:

1. Review the proposed practitioner operating model for your clinic, including the intended practitioner engagement arrangements and the way the clinic proposes to operate commercially and operationally;

2. Provide written legal advice regarding the proposed practitioner engagement structure, including:

a. the distinction between employment and independent practitioner arrangements;

b. key legal and operational factors that may increase the risk of practitioners being characterised as employees;

c. practical structuring considerations relevant to reducing employment, superannuation and payroll tax risk exposure at a high level;

d. how fees, billing, patient relationships, branding, facilities, records and administrative support should ideally be structured from a practitioner engagement perspective; and

e. the legal and operational considerations relevant to implementing a practitioner services model within the clinic;

3. Provide our recommended practitioner engagement structure from a legal perspective, including:

a. which legal agreement structure is most appropriate for the proposed practitioner engagement model;

b. key contractual considerations relevant to the proposed structure; and

c. any matters that should be referred to other professionals such as your accountant or financial adviser for further tax or entity-structuring advice.

Important exclusions

For the avoidance of doubt, this Fast Track Solution does not include:

• drafting, reviewing or amending practitioner agreements, employment agreements or other legal documentation;

• detailed tax or payroll tax advice;

• accounting or financial advice;

• cross-jurisdictional payroll tax advice; or

• implementation of the recommended structure.

If you would like You Legal to draft or review the recommended legal documentation following this advice, this would be addressed as a separate stage of work.

Frequently asked questions

The way practitioners are engaged within a healthcare practice can significantly affect employment, superannuation, payroll tax and operational risk exposure. Many practices implement employment or independent practitioner services models without fully considering whether the structure aligns with how the clinic actually operates in practice.

This Fast Track Solution is designed to help practices identify potential structural risks and better understand the legal and operational considerations relevant to practitioner engagement.

No. This Fast Track Solution may assist:

• new practices establishing their practitioner engagement model;

• existing practices reviewing current arrangements;

• practices introducing new services or different categories of practitioners; and

• practices seeking to reduce risk exposure as their business evolves.

No. This Fast Track Solution includes preliminary structuring advice only.

While we will provide recommendations regarding the most appropriate legal agreement structure for the proposed model, drafting or reviewing any practitioner agreements or related legal documentation is not included and this would be addressed as a separate stage of work.

This Fast Track Solution includes high-level legal structuring considerations relevant to payroll tax risk exposure only.

Accounting advice and State-based tax advice are outside the scope of this Solution and should be obtained from your accountant. 

Detailed payroll tax advice is outside the scope of this Solution however, we can provide this to you under a separate stage of work, which is available as a Fast Track Solution here.

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