Finance & Commercial Assistant in Dumbarton

VWS Ltd is seeking a proactive and detail-oriented Finance & Commercial Assistant to support our finance, purchasing, and commercial control functions as the business continues to grow. This is a hands-on role combining finance administration, bookkeeping support, purchasing coordination, and credit control activities. The role would suit an organised and commercially aware finance professional who enjoys working across multiple functions, supporting the Finance Manager, managers, suppliers, and external accountants, while playing a key role in maintaining accurate financial records and controls.

Key Responsibilities

• The Finance & Commercial Assistant will support the day-to-day finance function and associated processes, assisting with the preparation of monthly management accounts including profit and loss, balance sheet, and cashflow reporting.
• The role will involve maintaining accurate company ledgers, nominal codes, and supporting documentation, as well as assisting with monthly close processes such as fixed asset depreciation, work-in-progress adjustments, stock reconciliation, payroll postings, and billing documents.
• The post holder will monitor cashflow and highlight potential issues to the Finance Manager in a timely manner, assist with budgets, forecasts, and KPI reporting, and liaise with external accountants to support statutory accounts, VAT, payroll, and HMRC processes.
• Preparing information for auditors and supporting audit processes will also form part of the role.
• In terms of bookkeeping and transaction processing, the role will involve overseeing accounts payable and receivable to ensure timely processing and accurate coding, managing client invoicing, payment approvals, debt monitoring, and bank reconciliations, and ensuring all financial records are scanned, stored, and filed correctly in line with company and GDPR requirements.
• The role will also support and validate work-in-progress valuations in collaboration with operational teams.
• The Finance & Commercial Assistant will support the purchasing process to ensure value for money and compliance with internal procedures. This will include obtaining and comparing supplier quotations, negotiating pricing, credit limits, and payment terms, creating and validating purchase orders raised by staff, matching purchase invoices to purchase orders, and ensuring correct nominal coding.
• The role will also involve maintaining purchasing and cashflow forecasting spreadsheets, overseeing stock control processes across all locations, and vetting and approving new suppliers in line with ISO and company requirements.
• Credit control responsibilities will include overseeing invoicing, applications for payment, and customer billing schedules, monitoring aged debt, issuing statements, and following up overdue accounts.
• The role will involve working closely with operational and commercial teams to resolve invoice queries and rejections, maintaining PPM and monitoring billing schedules, and escalating persistent or high-risk debt issues to the Finance Manager with clear supporting information.
• The post holder will work collaboratively with finance, operations, and commercial teams, working closely with managers, engineers, and operational staff to ensure financial accuracy and alignment with project delivery.
• Attendance at meetings will be required to support financial reporting and commercial discussions, and the role requires maintaining confidentiality and exercising professional judgement when handling sensitive information.

Skills & Experience

• Applicants should have experience in a finance, accounts, or commercial support role and a strong working knowledge of accounting systems such as Xero.
• A solid understanding of bookkeeping, purchasing, credit control, and cashflow management is essential, along with experience producing management accounts, forecasts, and KPI reporting.
• The successful candidate will be a confident communicator, able to engage effectively with the Finance Manager, managers, suppliers, and external advisors.
• They will be highly organised, detail-oriented, and comfortable managing multiple priorities, with a commercially aware and proactive problem-solving mindset.

Why Join VWS?

This is a stable, office-based role within a growing and well-established business, offering the opportunity to develop strong technical finance and commercial experience within a supportive team environment and a clear reporting structure. A competitive salary package is available, aligned with experience.

Interested? Applications should be submitted via the CV-Library platform.