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Assistant Accountant

Employer
Essex County Council
Location
England, Essex, Chelmsford
Salary
Up to £22.00 per hour + PAYE
Closing date
9 Aug 2021

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Sector
Corporate Services, Finance
Job role
Accountant
Contract Type
Interim

Assistant Accountant

This position will initially, in line with current government guidance be based from home, with an expectation of being home based for the foreseeable future. However, if / when government guidelines change the role may then revert to being office based, whilst retaining some flexible working options.

Job Purpose

The role is within our Strategic Finance and Insight team, which leads on planning, budgeting, reporting, insight and managing the Council's funding position. The role will primarily focus on the Council's funding position, working closely with districts and boroughs and other senior stakeholders in the finance team. It is therefore vital you have prior experience working in a local government finance team.

The Assistant Accountant will deliver all aspects of financial management reporting (both Revenue and Capital with key members of the Finance team and budget holders to ensure customer needs are met.

This role is responsible for the preparation of high quality financial advice, information and analysis to budget holders within a functional area, across the financial cycle.

You will build strong relationships with finance colleagues, budget holders and all relevant internal partners and actively participate and contribute to projects.

Service/Functional Accountabilities

  • Deliver timely and accurate financial information throughout the financial cycle and provide advice to budget holders to ensure the effective management of budgets and value for money services.
  • Supports budget holders to ensure they can develop financial plans and to carry out their financial management duties.
  • Provides analysis and interpretation of financial and performance data to ensure the business can underpin their decisions with robust financial information and advice.
  • Supports budget holders sharing financial knowledge to ensure they understand the implications of unit costs and interpret variances more robustly. Deliver accurate financial estimates, forecasts and plans ensuring all identified risks are quantified, monitored and controlled and mitigations appropriately recorded.
  • Supports and co-ordinates the timely delivery and preparation of information to ensure quality of financial information for both monthly reporting, business cases or projects.
  • Coordinate the delivery and deliver information to ensure the annual accounts closure programme can meet the agreed deadlines.
  • Specific individual and shared targets and objectives are defined annually within the performance management framework.

Skills, Knowledge and Experience

  • Minimum full AAT (Level 4) qualification or equivalent, plus one year's experience as an Accounting Technician.
  • Evidence of continuing professional development and expert knowledge in relevant professional area.
  • Knowledge and understanding of financial management, financial planning and management for budgets and experience of providing financial advice to budget holders.
  • Experience of working with a range of financial systems and processes.
  • Evidence of working collaboratively and engaging with senior managers and finance colleagues across the finance function, together with good communication skills.
  • Experience of working in a large complex organisation and contributing to change.
  • Experience of supporting multi-disciplinary teams to achieve service outcomes.
  • Local Government experience

Please note that Essex County Council has determined that the off-payroll working rules will apply to this assignment and where a worker elects to provide their services through an intermediary (such as a personal services company) then income tax and primary national insurance contributions will be deducted at source from any payments made to the intermediary.

As part of employment with Essex County Council (ECC) should your role require a DBS check you will be required to register with the DBS update service. The DBS update service ensures all registered DBS certificates are kept up to date and allows authorised parties to view the status of your certificate. This is an annual subscription and you will be responsible for ensuring this is maintained. For further information on the DBS update service please go to https://www.gov.uk/dbs-update-service

If you have any queries regarding this role, or require anything further, please contact the Canidate Care Team on 0333 013 5888.

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