Divisional Finance Analyst

Who are we? First Rail Holdings is part of FirstGroup, the largest rail operator in the UK and second largest bus operator in the UK outside London. FirstGroup operates services throughout the UK and Ireland, with over 30,000 employees providing services that make travel smoother and life easier. FirstGroup works hard to reduce its impact on the environment, introducing cleaner and more environmentally responsible methods of transport.

About the job The Divisional Finance Analyst role is a key role supporting the Head of FP&A, and is responsible for the robust financial management and control of First Rail Holdings, Mistral & EvoRail through the accurate processing of financial transactions and the production of financial plans/forecast. In addition, the role ensures the financial performance of First Rail, and all its entities, is well understood by the management team through robust and accurate financial management reporting. Highlighting any issues and opportunities for improvement, and ensuring that the reporting being delivered by the TOCs/Rail Companies is in line with the requirements of the First Rail Management team, the Group Finance team and DfT.

Your main responsibilities will be:

• Collate and consolidate management and financial accounting outputs, KPIs, milestones, cash flows and balance sheets, Business Plan, and other financial/performance outputs
• Consolidate the periodic financial results and financial plans from the First Rail Entities in SAP BPC and conduct and maintain the process to submit into the Group Finance's consolidation tool (Hyperion/Onestream).
• Manage the co-ordination of reconciliations for intercompany posting, P&L and Balance Sheet, ensure all parties are clear and adhere to the process and post elimination journals.
• Coordination of Half Year and Full Year disclosures required by Group and the collation of the entities Annual Account Reconciliation.
• Post Central IFRS16 journals and other consolidation journals in SAP.
• Support the environment disclosure reporting by Group through collation, provision and reconciliation of data to be used in internal and external publications.
• Ensure the planning and reporting timetables and business process flows in BPC reflect the required business planning and reporting outputs and enables effective monitoring of delivery against timetables.
• Support in the Head of FP&A and System Accountant in the development and ongoing maintenance/utilisation of SAP BPC for financial planning.
• Ensure the delivery, accuracy, and integrity of the management accounting process for FRH, Mistral and Evo rail.
• Maintaining the reporting structures e.g. profit centre hierarchies of the management accounts so that it appropriately reflects the business structure and needs of management.
• Business partner the MDs and business leads, providing interpretation and guidance in relation to financial analysis, profit centre budgets and forecasts, to enable key decisions to be made and targets met.
• The planning and production of budget and quarterly forecast, working with the budget holders to have clear view of FY projections and ensure the communication of planning deadlines.
• Supporting business leads with the management of affiliate work orders, ensure all services are contract correctly through the affiliate framework and producing periodic or forecast intercompany schedules for distribution to trading partners.
• Production of balance sheet reconciliation and ensuring appropriate actions are taken to manage key balance sheet accounts.
• Raising sales orders for affiliate works order in FRH, Mistral and EvoRail for billing by our shared service centre (FSS), working with FSS to manage credit control activities.
• Produce submission to Group or HMRC for VAT, PAYE, NI as well as process the payroll and payments runs including management of expense system SAP concur.
• Production of draft statutory accounts and dealing with and closing out audit queries both internal and external.

Job Specific Knowledge and skills:

• Variance and financial/budgetary analysis
• Forecasting
• Prepare financial transactions, statements and information
• Transactional Accounting and Closing Processes
• Planning and preparing for Audits
• Systems and software
• Cost accounting
• Risk and control
• Professional accounting principles and standards
• Sales ledger management and credit control
• Management reporting and external reporting and ad-hoc communication
• Commercial acumen
• Treasury
• Financial Accounting principles and standards

As a minimum, you will need to have:

• Proven track record of preparing financial statements and management accounts.
• Proven track record of effective Cash Working Capital Management
• Experience in providing insight and analysis to finance and non-finance colleagues
• Proven track record of providing value add insight and recommendations
• Experience within Rail would be useful but is not essential
• Head office / group finance experience would be advantageous but is also not essential
• Educated to degree standard or equivalent
• Qualified accountant (i.e. CIMA/ ACA /ACCA) or equivalent

We all belong at First Rail Holdings. FirstGroup's vision is to provide an inclusive environment for all colleagues, across its group of businesses, ensuring all candidates have an equal opportunity to access meaningful employment. We value our differences such as age, gender, LGBTQIA+, ethnicity, religion, and disability. We maintain a zero tolerance towards any form of prejudice towards our colleagues, customers, and future talent. We celebrate and encourage diversity of thought, progressive ways of working and seeing all our colleagues grow and thrive. We review all roles and job descriptions to ensure they are accessible and, where possible, we support and provide flexible working options; we recommend that you refer to each vacancy description for further details. If you require additional support to complete your application due to a disability or neurodivergent condition, for example, dyslexia, dyspraxia, or autism, please follow the links below. We encourage you to share any additional needs you may require so we can provide a fair and equal process for all who apply.