Research Finance Officer

Are you an experienced within finance with excellent analytical and excel skills?
Are you looking to start a new role working for a truly unique organisation and excellent career opportunities?
Do you value a role which can offer great work life balance flexibility and hybrid working?
If so this role could be the opportunity, you are looking for!
Working as part of the the Research Finance team who are responsible for managing annual research income of around GBP250 million from a portfolio of approx. 2,500 live research grants and contracts across the organisation.
This is a great team of around 70 employees, who manage all post award activities for all research grants and contracts. Their mission is to be a true business partners to their research community providing exceptional guidance, support and insight and working collaboratively as one team in delivering world class transformative research.
What will you be doing as a Finance Research Officer?
· Your primary responsibility is to assist Senior Research Finance Officers to business partner with our key internal and external stakeholders
· Support operations for all post award deliverables and tasks within an assigned portfolio of research awards
· Secondary point of contact for internal and external stakeholders within assigned portfolio of research awards
· Understand broadly the main terms & conditions of the awards within the assigned portfolio of research awards and support the Senior Research Finance Officer with all financial reporting and audit conditions as required
· Support the Senior Research Finance Officer in providing relevant and reliable oversight of each research award within assigned portfolio to include but not limited to: Producing accurate and timely financial reporting to the Principal Investigator - budget versus actuals
· Attending regular review meetings with the Principal Investigator - as mandated by the funder T&Cs and/or as required by the PI
· Ensuring costs charged to the research awards are eligible within the terms & conditions of the individual awards
· Providing forecasting and budgetary advice and guidance as required by the Principal Investigator and/or as mandated by the terms and conditions of the research awards
· Supporting regular financial oversight reviews of the awards within the assigned portfolio to assess any financial and/or reputational risks and resolve and/or escalate within the agreed policies and procedures as set by management
· Understanding the basic financial accounting required to accurately record all eligible income and costs to research awards or to correct errors in income and expenses charged to research awards within assigned portfolio
· Ensure all eligible estates and indirects to be charged to the research awards are accounted for within the correct financial year within the assigned portfolio
· Ensuring all interim, annual and final claims, invoices & financial reporting to the external funder within assigned portfolio is complied with per contractual deadlines
· Supporting the regular review aged debtors to ensure claims and invoices are cash settled within the credit terms as set by the university. Supporting the resolution of issues and escalating to line manager as appropriate. Outstanding payments to the university to be maintained within limits set by management
· Supporting the assessment and calculation of monthly provisions for applicable research awards within assigned portfolio per month end reporting timetable
What will you require to become a Finance Research officer:
· Qualified to AAT level 2 or equivalent (or relevant qualifications/work experience)
· Have experience of working in a finance environment
· Be able to demonstrate excellent communication skills, verbal and written, with the ability to communicate with all levels of seniority
· Have excellent IT skills, to include intermediate excel skills and be able to demonstrate analytical skills over a large amount of data
· Possess strong numeracy skills demonstrating accuracy and attention to detail
· Ability to quickly grasp complex details, analyse, summarise and evaluate
· Excellent customer service skills and the ability to deliver a high-quality and professional service to all users
· Highly organised and be able to manage own work and prioritise potentially conflicting workloads with varying deadlines
· Be effective at solving problems
· Be able to demonstrate initiative, innovation and self-motivation in their work
· Fully committed to their work-colleagues through supportive team working
What you will get in return:
· Fantastic market leading Pension scheme
· 14 months contract with great opportunities of longer term career prospects in the wider organisation
· 35 hours per week - flexible working hours and hybrid working options available
· Competitive salary GBP26,444 - GBP29,605
· Excellent employee health and wellbeing services including an Employee Assistance Programme
· Exceptional starting annual leave entitlement, plus bank holidays
· Additional paid closure over the Christmas period
· Local and national discounts at a range of major retailers
If this sounds like a role you will LOVE, please send your CV to us today!
We aim to respond to all successful applications within 2 days. If you haven't been contacted within 2 days your application has been unsuccessful. Please check our Website and apply directly for any other suitable positions you see. We apologise that we are unable to contact everyone in person and thank you for your interest.
Are you on Facebook? Consider following our Facebook page as this is the first place where we post the most up to date vacancies, along with CV tips, interview techniques and so much more. Check us out on Facebook.