Financial Accountant

18 month FTC. This role combines hands-on accounting and finance expertise with responsibility for the financial planning and reporting processes for the clients UK non-insurance entities, as well as ownership of tax accounting and filing processes for the UK tax groups. You will be a trusted adviser to the Head of Finance and senior management team, providing guidance on finance, accounting and tax across the Finance function and to the wider business. You will develop robust business processes for the production of statutory and management reporting, as well as effective planning and forecasting mechanisms. You will work closely with the senior management teams of the UK businesses to provide accurate and timely financial information and insight. You will manage the production of VAT and Corporation Tax returns for the UK tax groups, and ensure our businesses comply with all necessary tax reporting and filing requirements. You will lead the development and delivery of efficient processes to enable effective decision making and performance management of the organisation. You will be resilient and flexible, able to apply your knowledge and skills to new challenges in an evolving operating model.

Duties & Responsibilities

• Coordinate the delivery of consistent and accurate accounting and financial reporting for the clients UK holding and service companies across IFRS and German GAAP bases, for plan, forecasts, and actual performance.
• Deliver internal financial and management reporting and forecasting to both the Group and senior local stakeholders, providing detailed analysis and explanations of the drivers of the results.
• Deliver external reporting requirements of the Companies under UK GAAP, including statutory accounts and preparation of Senior Accounting Officer deliverables.
• Develop and maintain excellent standards of control, governance, and documentation across the UK financial accounting deliverables, proactively and continuously improving processes.
• Coordinating UK tax compliance for all of the clients UK entities. This includes income tax and VAT calculations, returns and payments, transfer pricing documentation and maintaining the local tax strategy.
• Support the delivery of the statutory audit processes for the UK companies, through effective management of the finance and accounting deliverables.
• Act as a trusted financial adviser to the Directors and management of the UK entities.
• Support the intercompany recharge process by preparing accurate allocations, ensuring compliance with Group policies, and maintaining clear documentation to enable transparent and well governed cost sharing.
• Act as a key financial liaison and facilitator between the UK service company and the Talanx insurance entities.
• Build effective and sustainable relationships locally and with Group to strengthen cross-departmental collaboration and foster a culture of trust and open feedback.
• Lead the delivery of UK financial accounting projects, as well as UK participation in Group projects.
• Maintain excellent knowledge of external developments that may impact Branch operations and deliver effective solutions to mitigate risks and take advantage of opportunities.

Qualifications Required

• Qualified accountant (ACA, ACCA).

Experience

• Financial services or insurance sector experience is an advantage.
• UK statutory accounting and financial reporting processes.
• Experience of UK Corporation Tax and VAT processes.
• Delivering process change or optimisation.

Personal Skills

• Communicating and Influencing: Positively impacts the actions and decisions of stakeholders ensuring that they are involved throughout. Negotiates confidently whilst maintaining relationships, building support and buy-in for ideas. Adapts communication style depending on audience.
• Problem solving: Uncovers information to identify causal links. Uses a variety of tools/techniques to break down complex issues and spots trends, patterns and interdependencies between issues. Analyses risks and is pragmatic when developing solutions.
• Delivery and Accountability: Is accountable for own and team delivery to support the overall Branch priorities and objectives. Prioritises deliverables and identifies roadblocks that might affect delivery. Creates a safe environment whereby people feel safe flagging mistakes.
• Innovation and Continuous Improvement: Creates and tests out new ideas and improvements which have a significant impact on the business operations or service offering. Identifies new ways of working and encourages ideas from own team/department and creates processes and inducements for team members to generate and test out ideas.
• Developing Capability and Knowledge Sharing: Actively develops talent and builds capability, acting as a role model across the business. Willingness to knowledge share and to learn from peers using a range of development solutions.
• Customer Focus: Has a deep understanding of customer needs. Takes action to overcome challenges and obstacles to ensure service excellence is maintained. Takes action to ensure that customer feedback is acted on and operational and technical challenges are overcome.
• Team worker: A key player in building and maintaining a positive team culture and cross-functional relationships. Engages partners and encourages others to build relationships and brings together diverse stakeholders to deliver objectives.