Financial Accountant, HM Revenue & Customs, Southend-on-Sea

About HMRC

HMRC is the UK's tax, payments and customs authority and we have a vital purpose: we collect the money that pays for the UK's public services and helps families and individuals with targeted financial support.

About Corporate Finance

Corporate Finance fulfils a vital role at the heart of HMRC. We are responsible for ensuring that HMRC plans and manages its performance, makes good decisions and is held to account on accurate financial and performance data. Our activity helps HMRC account excellently for everything HMRC does.

Your Role

As part of Corporate Finance you will take up a position within the external Reporting and Analysis team; playing a crucial role in providing both Financial and Management information across all areas of the Department, accounting for over £600bn of tax revenue.

Over the next 3/4 years HMRC will be transforming its tax accounting by moving everything from old legacy accounting systems onto a modern IT platform. This will support HMRC’s goal to become one of the most digitally advanced tax administrations in the world. Additionally, EU Exit will bring changes to the way we account for certain taxes.

It is an exciting time to join HMRC Finance and the position offers a unique and useful insight into the work HMRC undertakes in the collection and accounting for taxes.

Your role will provide an excellent opportunity to operate within a small future focused team, helping to drive the transformation of tax accounting, initially by delivering on changes required through EU Exit.

As a qualified or part qualified accountant you and your team will be involved in a variety of projects to aid transformation and at the same time gain assurance that the newly developed systems and processes will correctly account for tax and report accurate data.

Key Responsibilities

With this unique Financial Accountant role you will be working within a specialised team of finance professionals responsible for contributing in the following ways:

• Providing accounting knowledge and supporting teams working on changes required to accounting process as a result of EU exit and development of any future required accounting systems;

• Providing accounting advice to the team responsible for signing off HMRC system/process changes on risks/issues and appropriate financial controls to ensure accounts production requirements are met;

• Acting as a key contact for the Customs audit handling team and EU inspectors;

• Working with stakeholders to ensure that any recommendations from NAO auditors and EU inspectors in relation to accounting practice and processes are dealt with in a timely and effective manner;

• Maintaining a detailed overview of account production processes and data flows relevant to the tax accounts and monitor any areas of risk identified;

• Working alongside those dealing with EU Exit issues and processes;

• Working alongside others on the preparation of accounts and assisting with audit queries as and when required;

• Working alongside and assisting when other Financial Accountants require help in resolving problems and covering their workloads when required;

• The opportunity to lead a small team may arise.

Essential Criteria:

• Experience of accounts preparation and liaising with auditors;
• Proven experience of modern accounting IT systems;
• Working knowledge of accounting standards;
• Strong communication and report writing skills;
• Ability to communicate technical concepts clearly and concisely.

Desirable Criteria:

• Experience of using SAP/Oracle;
• Experience of IT systems development;
• Public sector finance experience.

Qualifications

Full professional qualification through one of the following six bodies:

• Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA)
• Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA)
• Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA)
• Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW)
• Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland (ICAI)
• Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland (ICAS)

Or

Partially qualified through one of the above six bodies where full qualification will be completed within one year of joining HMRC.
Behaviours
We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

Working Together
Communicating and Influencing