Temporary Business Rates Officer- Revenue & Benefits

Reference no: Newham RQ640886

Key responsibilities:

• Effectively respond to all enquiries received by letter, telephone, in person (where required) and electronically.
• Ensure all necessary action is taken to collect revenue efficiently and effectively & process applications for reliefs and other reductions with due regard to internal and external fraud prevention and detection.
• Deal with difficult queries including complaints by correspondence, telephone, face to face (where required) and electronically, ensuring timely, accurate, appropriate responses and suggest remedial action where weakness in service delivery is identified.
• Submit irrecoverable debt for write off in line with delegated powers, audit requirements and internal procedures.
• Comply with procedures to maintain an accurate database, fulfill audit requirements, and meet / exceed internal & external accreditations.
• Undertake proactive work and participate in outreach work to improve collection.
• Liaise with and instruct the Enforcement Agents and other relevant bodies i.e. Solicitors / Process Server, on the appropriate course of action to ensure effective revenue collection.  Report to your manager on their performance.
• Prepare cases relating to proceedings at the Magistrates Court, County Court and other courts as directed.
• Represent the Council and provide evidence at the Magistrates’ Court to successfully obtain Liability Orders. Represent the Council in court to defend Liability Orders when required.
• Deal with all aspects of Insolvency where the Council is not the petitioning creditor and ensure information is passed to the Official Receiver / Trustee as required. Maintain accurate records of all insolvency cases.
• Identify and prepare cases for committal hearings, interviewing customers where required.
• Make application for warrants of arrest with and without bail as appropriate.
• Prepare records and maintain statistics as directed. Deal with system reports and other output as required.
• Provide information for the reporting, management and quality of throughput on the team as required.
• Undertake quality checks to ensure accuracy of processing as directed.

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

Experience & Knowledge / Technical skills

• A minimum of one year’s experience as a Business Rates Officer
• High level knowledge of Business Rates legislation
• High level knowledge of issues relating to debt recovery and enforcement
• High level knowledge of Court proceedings for the recovery of unpaid revenue
• Understanding of Local Government departments and services
• Good basic education, ideally with five GCSE qualifications (including Maths and English).
• Must be experienced in monitoring targets and performance, collating information and analysing statistical data for input into management reports.
• Previous experience in a debt collection, benefit recovery or similar environment
• Working accurately under pressure within tight timescales
• Experience of dealing with challenging customers
• Experience of preparing statistical information, interpret legislation, produce reports and respond to complaints.

Skills & Abilities

• Excellent communication skills including the ability to liaise with external bodies and represent the council at court
• Ability to deal with customers enquiries by letter, telephone or in person
• Excellent debt negotiation skills
• Excellent administrative and organisational skills
• Computer skills to update the council’s records accurately
• Ability to work as part of a team and on own initiative
• Ability to use Microsoft Office applications,
• Good numeracy skills and an ability to understand basic finance
• Ability to be flexible, creative, and self-motivated.
• Courteous and pleasant telephone manner
• Willingness to learn and to be flexible
• Good organisational skills

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.