Management Accountant

About Us
EPUT provides community health, mental health and learning disability services to support more than 3.2 million people living across Bedfordshire, Essex and Suffolk. Also:

• We are among the largest employers in the East of England region, with more than 10,000 staff working across more than 200 sites.
• We run the COVID-19 vaccination programme across mid and south Essex and Suffolk and north east Essex.

EPUT was formed on 1 April 2017 following the merger of North Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (NEP) and South Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust (SEPT). A new leadership team was established at the Trust in 2020.

Our vision and values
Our Vision

“To be the leading health and wellbeing service in the provision of mental health and community care”.

Our Purpose

“We care for people every day. What we do together, matters”.

Our Values

• We Care
• We Learn
• We Empower

Our strategic objectives

• We will deliver safe, high quality integrated care services.
• We will enable each other to be the best that we can.
• We will work together with our partners to make our services better.
• We will help our communities to thrive.

Job overview
ROLE SUMMARY – This post is also available to MSEFT, MSE and ICB

• To support the provision of a comprehensive financial management service to clinical and/or corporate managers within one or more directorates. This will involve working closely with budget managers to provide financial management advice and support using information produced by the management accounting team.
• The role involves the production of timely and accurate management information and requires both technical knowledge of accounting procedures and an understanding of the operational business of the Trust.
• The management accountant is part of a team providing support to one or more Executive Directors. Within this larger team, each management accountant works with a senior management accountant providing financial management information and advice to a defined group of budget holders.

Main duties of the job
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• To assist the senior management accountant in the production of monthly budget reports for services within one or more directorates, ensuring that the monthly reporting timetable is achieved, the data within the reports is accurate, and correctly takes account of all appropriate accruals and pre-payments. This will include reconciling budget movements, monitoring savings plans, and identifying and investigating variances.

Working for our organisation
Putting our values into practice

• We Care: Better care leads to better outcomes. Our care will be individualised, therapeutic and trauma-informed, and we will support our staff to be resilient at work by prioritising their health and wellbeing.

• We Learn: We will develop our culture of learning, reflecting carefully when things go wrong and championing continuous improvement. We will embed gold standard learning processes and cycles that help us create new knowledge.

• We Empower: We will create a culture of co-production, with lived experience and staff experience informing all our plans. We will empower our service users, their families, and their supporters to set their own care and recovery goals and empower our staff to draw on and apply their managerial and clinical expertise.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• Prepare and input journals to correct coding errors, enter monthly commitments and pre-payments ensuring appropriate supporting information is provided and transactions are correctly authorised.
• Prepare and input budget virements ensuring that the trust virement policy and procedures are adhered to.
• Meet regularly with budget holders to discuss financial performance and to understand the reasons for any variances. In conjunction with the senior management accountant, provide challenge, support and advice to ensure that variances are dealt with, and financial control is maintained.
• Undertake costings for new developments and service enhancements within the service area supported.
• Assist with the annual budget setting process, which will include costing an approved staffing establishment and maintaining budget working papers.
• Raise invoices for directorate income correctly and regularly. Provide appropriate and clear supporting information for charges.
• Provide advice to budget holders on trust financial and purchasing systems and interpretation of the financial statements provided to them.
• Understand and comply with key financial procedures and policies including Trust Standing Orders, Standing Financial Instructions and purchasing procedures. Provide advice and clarification to budget holders as required.
• Contribute to the production of the Trust Annual Accounts, completing working papers, analysis and returns as directed.

ADDITIONAL DUTIES

In addition to the above duties you will also be expected to perform the below key activities in line with your job role;

• Complete mandatory training in line with Trust policy and procedures.
• To participate in the staff appraisal process and to undertake for any staff you manage.
• To keep yourself updated on all matters relating to Trust policy.
• To provide management supervision where appropriate.

Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria

• GSCE Grades A to C

Desirable criteria

• Excel Skills and an interest in a career in accountancy

Essential criteria

• AAT or equivalent level 4 qualification in finance, accountancy or business or by finance experience.

Desirable criteria

• Comprehensive knowledge of management accounting processes

Please note – staff who are formally at risk within the organisation will be given priority in securing alternative employment. Should it come to light that a post being advertised by the Trust is considered ‘suitable alternative employment’ to an individual who is at risk, the recruiting manager will be advised and the post will be withdrawn from NHS Jobs.
Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Applications for this role should be written by the applicant. If artificial intelligence (AI) programmes are used then the application may be rejected due to this document being an important part of the assessment process. This does not prevent applicants seeking appropriate support with applications should they need to for the purposes of any declared disability.

Important Professional References

Make sure that as a part of your application you have professional references with business contract information covering your last three year employment history. We are unable to accept personal or character references.

As a newly appointed employee you are responsible for incurring the cost of your initial DBS check relevant to your post, the amount will be deducted from your first salary with the Trust.

Applications for Job Share are positively welcomed.

Equal Opportunities Employer

Our Trust is an Equal Opportunities Employer. We particularly welcome applications from people with experience of using mental health services. We also hold the Disability two tick symbol and have made the pledge to commit to employing more people with learning disabilities, we encourage people with a disability to apply. If you require this application form in another format i.e. Braille or audio tape etc, please contact the Recruitment Department on 01375 364513 or email (email protected) and we can arrange for this to be dispatched to you.

The Trust has the right to expire vacancies prior to the closing date if they so wish. The Trust makes every attempt to contact all applicants and we strongly advise that you check the email account which is registered with NHS Jobs regularly, we would advise however due to the high number of applications we receive that if you have not heard from us within three weeks of the closing date your application has been unsuccessful on this occasion.

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults, and expect all staff to undertake this commitment. Applicants will be subject to robust safer recruitment processes.

Covid Vaccination

Although Covid vaccinations are no longer a mandatory requirement within the NHS we continue to encourage and support the vaccination uptake as this remains the best line of defence against Covid19. The safety of our staff and patients is a top priority for us at EPUT.

If you would like to book a Covid vaccination or would like more information please contact us by emailing (email protected).

Employer certification / accreditation badges

Documents to download

• Job Description ( PDF , 616.5 KB )
• Person Specification ( PDF , 552.3 KB )
• Why Join The NHS Pension Scheme ( PDF , 91.3 KB )
• EPUT Pledge – Step into Health ( PDF , 211.0 KB )
• Candidate Privacy Policy ( PDF , 336.6 KB )
• Right to Work Information ( PDF , 293.6 KB )
• Employer Recognition Scheme – Gold Award ( PDF , 27.7 KB )
• Trust Vision and Values ( PDF , 168.9 KB )
• Values of the NHS Pension ( PDF , 151.3 KB )

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