Sweeping reforms enshrined in the federal budget this week hope to rein in the spiralling cost of the $50 billion scheme.
Tightening eligibility alongside tougher provider registration requirements are just some of the measures hoped to claw back $37.8 billion over the next four years.
New laws introduced on Thursday will require Australians to have exhausted all other treatment options before they are considered permanently impaired to enter the scheme.
The bill will also give Health Minister Mark Butler sweeping powers to put a break on certain parts of the program as well as to enable automated decision-making.
"Being able to automate some of these basic administrative functions free up our highly qualified public servants, frankly, to do more work with actual interaction with human beings where that interaction is particularly important," he told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.
A concurrently running Senate inquiry into the administration of the scheme will hear on Friday from disability organisations, groups and service providers.
National Disability Services - the nation's peak body for disability service organisations - has called for mandatory registration of all providers to make the scheme more transparent and accountable.
With about 94 per cent of NDIS providers currently unregistered, most are able to operate outside consistent regulatory oversight, limiting transparency and early risk detection.
Chief executive Michael Perusco warned the scheme has strayed far beyond its original purpose of supporting people with a lifelong, significant disability.
"Current challenges reflect not only gaps in compliance and oversight, but broader issues in system design, including uneven regulatory coverage, misaligned incentives, and limited visibility across the market," he said in written submissions.
Though these will be partially addressed by the changes announced by government, gaps remain.
Professor Jennifer Smith-Merry from the Centre for Disability Research and Policy at the University of Sydney will also draw on research conducted with NDIS participants, carers, and stakeholders from across Australia.
"Highly vulnerable participants ... are actively targeted for scams, coercion, and financial exploitation," findings submitted to the inquiry read.
The researchers found providers often take a "minimalistic approach" where non-compliance is normalised.
NDIS participants reported routine tasks being poorly completed, despite long billed hours.
"It clearly says what people have to, do but it's a nightmare to get them to do it," one participant said.
"I check all invoices… the amount of invoices I have seen that are claiming for time that they haven't done, services that they haven't performed ... 50 per cent of them I'd say and nobody checks," another reported.
