Finance Officer

Responsibilities:

• To carry out all duties in compliance with the University’s financial regulations and established procedures, and to support continuous improvement of faculty finance procedures, suggesting improvements and taking any necessary steps to facilitate their communication and implementation.
• Carry out a range of month-end, quarter-end and year-end procedures (including accruals and prepayments), ensuring the Faculty’s financial position against budget is effectively monitored and appropriate investigative or corrective action taken. This will include ensuring that the Faculty meets its budgetary targets, ensuring value for money and making savings where necessary; bringing financial issues promptly to the attention of the Faculty Board Chair and HAF.
• Management of all day-to-day core finance functions within the Faculty, including purchase orders and sales invoices, expenses claims, sales invoices, donations, trust funds, studentship payments, VAT reporting, month end/year end processes, and all non-academic and casual payroll administration. May be required to scrutinise and manage the academic payroll in liaison with the HAF and Divisional Finance team.
• Prepare the Faculty’s annual budget and quarterly forecasts for review by the HAF and Divisional Financial Controller to specified timetables. Will include in depth analysis of key lines in accounts, sources of funding and available balances, and estimating financial impact of certain faculty decisions. Attending meetings as required to review budgets/forecasts.
• Contribute to the development of the medium-/long-term strategic plan for the Faculty, including providing financial modelling for different scenarios.
• Responsibility for post grant financial administration and overseeing the financial management of research projects/centres. To include (but not limited to) ensuring project set up is correct and appropriate, making PIs aware of relevant processes and funder terms and conditions (T&C’s), providing reports to PIs, supporting PIs to understand their finances, identifying early any possible overspends, submission of timesheets, awareness of project end dates, ensure costs comply with funder T&C’s, support any necessary audits. May also need to assist with the costing of research grant applications, liaising with the Research Support Team and HAF to ensure applications are financially viable.
• Supervise the work of a Finance Assistant (FA), and supporting any training and development as required. Provide cover for FA in their absence.
• Provide expert advice and assistance on financial issues to the HAF, the Faculty Board, its committees and officers, including the interpretation and explanation of financial data, rules and regulations, and resource allocation methods. Deputise for the HAF on finance related matters as required. Act as main contact for finance queries from wider University including Humanities Division, central Finance and from auditors.
• To be involved in the wider Divisional finance team, helping out or undertaking projects as appropriate and as agreed by the Head of Administration and Finance.
• To advise on utilisation of the funds in line with funder terms and conditions, and ensure all expenditure is appropriately coded.
• To undertake any other tasks commensurate with the grade and role.