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About the Team
Warwickshire County Council is a highly successful and financially resilient local authority. Responsible for a £489 million gross revenue budget annually and a 5-year capital programme of £655 million, we deliver vital public services, from highways management to complex social support. Within a challenging budgetary context, we rely on innovative financial thinking and inspired strategic planning to ensure we deploy our resources to maximise value and impact of investment for our 608,000 residents.
About the Role
Sitting in the Strategic Finance team and directly responsible to the Finance Manager – Capital & Technical, you’ll play a key role in the provision of advice on all VAT, taxation and commercial issues to officers at all levels of our organisation.
The key focus of this role is twofold:
- providing financial monitoring and evaluation support to the Council on its arrangements with its local authority trading companies and joint venture partners.
- providing strategic and professional taxation support and advice, particularly regarding VAT, where the role will develop and manage all aspects of tax planning, reporting and compliance across the Council.
Commercial
Primary responsibilities will include financial oversight and reporting of the Council’s traded arms (with particular focus on the Warwickshire Property & Development Group). This will include monitoring the performance of these entities against the Council’s Medium Term Financial Strategy, ensuring the funding arrangements within the wider Warwickshire group receive a high level of assurance, financial accuracy and integrity and meets the Council’s financial regulations and, crucially, the Warwickshire Property & Development Group’s business plan and funding requirements.
You will provide financial advice and guidance, financial modelling capability, supporting the evaluations of business cases for approval at various stages and supporting the consolidation of subsidiaries and Joint Ventures into the Warwickshire County Council group accounts.
Taxation
You will proactively anticipate, research, interpret and analyse current and proposed tax regulations, determining their effect on the Council and the services it provides. You will use your initiative in problem solving in minimising the Council’s tax liabilities.
You must be comfortable giving day to day VAT advice to service departments and assist in the provision of training on VAT across the council. Development opportunities exist with working on more complex areas of taxation to support and assist the Strategic Finance team, especially on VAT implications arising from investment proposals and capital projects.
Key responsibilities will consist of:
- overseeing the monthly VAT return to a high-quality standard on a timely basis whilst ensuring compliance with the ‘Making Tax Digital’ rules.
- work proactively on maintaining HMRC VAT compliance across the council, including monitoring the Council’s partial exemption position.
- undertaking regular monitoring of the financial system to ensure the correct treatment and coding of VAT.
- providing expert input into current and emerging VAT projects as they arise.
- Being WCC’s day to day liaison with HMRC.
- ensuring consistent and correct treatment of other tax matters.
The applicant is expected to possess adaptability and the capability of undertaking a number of tax tasks and potentially conflicting demands with minimal supervision, to a high standard and within tight timescales.
This is a fantastic opportunity to take your Finance experience to the next level, maintaining and developing the reputation of our high-profile Strategic Finance team and ensuring its success.
Key Requirements
A qualified finance or taxation professional, ideally with experience of working in a local authority, or similar complex organisation. Your in-depth technical knowledge is matched with well-developed people skills.
You relish a new challenge and expect the opportunity to make a difference. You’re comfortable analysing a multi-dimensional financial picture, alongside relevant tax and commercial legislation, without compromising your keen eye for detail. This demanding role will take you further, offering opportunities to support and advise managers at all levels of the organisation to ensure projects and service delivery remain compliant with the latest strategies, business plans, taxation rules and regulations.
Building on your finance and Taxation knowledge, with Warwickshire embarking on an exciting journey as part of its commercial strategy, there is also a requirement to control and report on its commercial arrangements and their impact on the Council’s finances, particularly in respect of the recently formed Warwickshire Property & Development Group.
Therefore, candidates must have a basic/intermediate level of proficiency with Word, an intermediate/advanced level of proficiency with Excel and have financial systems experience (preferably Unit4 Agresso). Attention to detail is important and candidates must be willing to continuously scan for opportunities to develop improvements to new and existing processes. Experience of VAT and Local Authority Trading Companies is preferred, however overall willingness to learn and to take on all aspects of commercial reporting and Taxation relevant to the Council is equally important.
You will be confident dealing with all levels of the organisation with excellent written and verbal communication skills, you will develop excellent internal and external working relationships to ensure an efficient exchange of information, providing guidance to colleagues across the Council including other members of the Finance service.
For further information please see the Job Description and Person Specification.
Working for Warwickshire – This is the difference you make
Warwickshire County Council is a place where everyone feels valued, included, safe, supported, and welcome. Our people are at the heart of this vision, could you be one of them!
At Warwickshire County Council we are committed to ensuring Warwickshire’s economy is vibrant and supported by the right jobs, training, skills and infrastructure. Our people vision for Warwickshire County Council is a great place to work where diverse and talented people are enabled to be their best.
Your future matters to us, we provide a generous pension scheme which includes an employer contribution rate of typically around 19 percent per month, to help support your financial security during retirement. The scheme also offers a valuable package of benefits for members and their dependants. To find out more please visit: Warwickshire Pension Fund homepage – Warwickshire Pension Fund'
The benefits we offer include agile working, a valuable part of the pay and reward package for employees working in local government, generous annual leave entitlement, plus bank holidays and an additional day at Christmas, and access to Vivup benefits and discounts platform.
Click here to view the benefits at Warwickshire County Council.
Additional Information
The Fluency Duty is outlined in the Code of Practice on the English language requirements for public sector workers. The Fluency Duty for this role is Required. You must be able to speak and provide advice in accurate spoken English to the public.
To discuss the role please contact Karen Clarke (Finance Manager – Capital & Technical) at karenclarke@warwickshire.gov.uk
Closing date: 15th April 2024
Interview date: 22nd April 2024
Should you require application forms in an alternative format / language or any adjustments to be made throughout the application process or upon appointment, please contact hrandpayroll@warwickshire.gov.uk and we will make every effort to meet your specific requirements.
Warwickshire County Council is committed to equality of opportunity for all employees and is keen to address areas of under representation in its workforce. See more
