Interim Accountant – Financial Services

Reference no:  MPS 0007 27A9 / 1

Pay Rate: Up to £344.00 per day PAYE depending on experience

This opening assignment is for 6 months

Hybrid working

Candidates with current CTC/SC/DV clearances will go through their vetting processes, currently this is taking up to 6 months.  If you are already in a contract that potentially is not ending for a few months and this role is of interest, do let us know, we would be happy to discuss further.

The purpose of the role is to provide a professional, high quality and responsive finance service that supports and promotes efficient and effective service delivery in line with the MOPAC objectives and priorities and those of the Chief Finance Officer.

The successful candidate will promote sound financial management, control, and practices that, comply with the MOPAC Constitution including Financial Regulations, Accounting Codes of Practice and all relevant legislation and government guidance in support of the Chief Officer’s requirements.

Key Responsibilities:

• Take responsibility for elements of the production of annual statutory financial accounts, estimates/ budgets and in-year reports ensuring they meet the required standards and timescales.
• Perform analysis and interpret data in line with accounting standards and suggest solutions and recommendations to decision-makers.
• To fully support the Head of Financial Planning and Finance Business Partners in carrying out financial management and accounting services.
• Line manage the Trainee Accountant to provide support across the Partnering area in Finance.
• Acts as the key interface in ensuring that appropriate financial systems, policies and processes are in place, and that all financial activities in delivery of MOPAC grant funding programmes and commissioning activity adhere to agreed policies and procedure.
• Oversee segments of, and deliver, the medium-term financial plan and actively promote this strategy across MOPAC and to act in accordance with the corporate objectives of the medium-term financial plan.
• Actively contribute to relevant change programmes and support continuous improvement of functions and services.
• Identify weaknesses in financial control and gaps in policies and procedures and to take steps to ensure these are mitigated and where appropriate, new policies and procedures are drafted and implemented.
• Support internal and external auditors and act as a key interface for their queries and information/ analysis requests.
• Contribute and oversee the development of MOPAC procedures, policy and practice, ensuring compliance with accounting codes of practice and statutory requirements.
• Engage in the drafting of briefings, decisions, Mayor’s Questions and the report writing of other key documents as directed, ensuring the Schemes of Governance are complied with.

“Role Requirements” – to give yourself the maximum chance of success please try and ensure your CV addresses the following essential criteria:

Qualifications:

1. Full or Part-Qualified CCAB progressing to Finalist Stage.

Skills & Experience:

1. Adept in the use of Excel/ spreadsheets, and preferably data analytics.
2. Good ability to draft and contribute to reports and briefings across the Finance team.
3. Very good communicator with the ability to provide evidence based insight to meetings with others in MOPAC.
4. Experience and involvement with grants/contracts/SLA’s, inclusive of monitoring for effectiveness and driving efficiencies.
5. Demonstrates a high level of understanding and appreciation of the political landscape and wider objectives.
6. Experience of working under pressure and making effective decisions within the scope of complex and critical budgets with multiple users and stakeholders.
7. Experience of providing technical accounting and financial advice to senior stakeholders.
8. Technical understanding of local authority accounting rules.
9. Understanding of best practice in financial management and control.
10. Extensive knowledge of the technical accounting required to fulfil this role.
11. Awareness of legislative/ regulatory framework within which MOPAC finances operate.
12. Effective communication skills with ability to present complex information to Finance Business Partners.
13. Ability to process, analyse and monitor financial data and provide information from data.

NB: Please feel free to apply to us direct via [email protected] by quoting the job reference and job title exactly. SEE DETAILS AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS AD.

If you have previously applied to one of our vacancies and have already sent the required supporting documentation to us, please make this clear when you re-apply as this will help speed up your application.

To help speed up the process of uploading your CV to the client we would suggest that you send us your CV in Word format (or equivalent) if possible, rather than as a PDF

If you are successful in securing this role, please note that for the entire duration of this contract, regardless of extension you will be working this role at the PAYE rate that has been advertised. For absolute clarity, we only work on a PAYE basis, rather than entertaining umbrella pay terms, we do not offer Ltd/umbrella or outside IR35 rates. If you wish to understand PAYE vs Umbrella more, please let us know and we can send you some additional information for clarity.