IPSA_Logo 360 x 180

Financial Controller

Contract type: Permanent

Full-time

Directorate: Finance

Salary: £55,000 - £60,000

 

 

Location:

The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) is a hybrid organisation. We have an office in central London which you can work from, although we welcome applications from all across the UK, offering flexible homeworking on UK mainland locations.

 

Background:

IPSA is the independent body that regulates and administers the business costs and decides the pay and pensions of the 650 elected Members of Parliament and their staff in the UK. We were created by the Parliamentary Standards Act 2009, as the world’s first independent regulator of MPs’ financial remuneration.

IPSA is on a mission! We want to enable MPs to do what really matters by providing an exemplary, seamless regulatory service. We have a compelling plan and we’re intent on transforming IPSA. Transparency lies at the heart of everything we do. We publish details of business costs claims made by MPs and their staff, as well as annual data about every MP’s spending and other aspects of their activity.

We are looking for an experienced Financial Controller to help us redesign and maintain robust financial controls ensuring the production of accurate, timely and complete financial information. You’ll be qualified CCAB or equivalent Accountant with demonstrable experience in the role of Financial Controller with regulatory experience in the public sector. You’ll take pride in ensuring the data is right first time every time, and you’ll work with others to improve processes, ensuring that sound financial management and governance runs through any broader organisational change.

 

About the role:

The Financial Controller is a leadership role within the Finance team and you’ll will work alongside an excellent, dedicated team. As part of the leadership team, this role is visible across IPSA and you’ll play a significant role in driving transformation and continuous improvement across the organisation, especially in ensuring that the financial data used by our customers, MPs and their staff, is current and accurate and drives excellent customer service. You’ll ensure IPSA regulates through service, delivering excellent service to MPs and colleagues across IPSA and maintaining robust financial controls.
 

Main responsibilities:

It’s an exciting time to join IPSA as we undertake the next stage of our transformation and change programme. We’re intent on continually improving our processes and ways of working so that we can deliver on our mission: to enable MPs to focus on what really matters by providing an exemplary, seamless regulatory service. To do this, there are number of immediate priorities which you’ll be responsible for:

  • Designing and maintaining robust financial controls. There are over 100 spreadsheets in use within the finance team currently, so you’ll determine which can be eliminated through process redesign, which can be moved to the ERP and which require an alternative system.
  • Leadership of a high performing Financial Control team (Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable and Financial Reporting Manager) to ensure accurate processing of payments, receipts and cash management and foster collaborative working across IPSA.
  • Running the month end process and managing all delegated activities. You’ll ensure accounts close runs to time, the balance sheet is accurate and variances are understood.
  • Ensuring transactions are accurate, validated and comply with relevant financial control KPIs.
  • Maintaining the integrity of IPSA’s accounting system (Unit4 Business World), including ledger and sub ledgers, to ensure accounting entries are generated correctly.

To help IPSA continue to deliver financial value and achieve its other strategic objectives, you’ll be responsible for the following longer-term activity:

  • Ensuring IPSA always retains the right balance between delivering excellent service to MPs, their staff and IPSA’s people (and maintaining robust financial controls). You’ll deliver continuous improvement across all financial and other appropriate processes.
  • Leading and developing a high performing Financial Control team and ensuring that sound financial management and governance runs through any broader organisational change.
  • Managing the year-end process, ensuring the IPSA Annual Report and Accounts continue to receive unqualified NAO audit opinions. You’ll also manage the interim accounts & audit, liaising with both internal and external auditors.
  • Ensuring IPSA’s quarterly and annual financial statements are aligned to the FReM and comply with IPSA’s accounts direction and other legislation.
  • Managing and maintaining excellent relationships with external Finance stakeholders, including HMRC and HM Treasury.
  • Bringing IPSA’s core values of Staying Connected, Seeing The Bigger Picture, Being Open, Doing The Right Thing and Making A Difference, to life through yours and your team’s behaviours and actions.  

 

What we are looking for:


Qualified CCAB or equivalent, you make complex and challenging financial information accessible to people at all levels of the organisation. You’ll provide inspiring leadership to create a high performing team. You’ll delegate effectively and develop others, using your knowledge to shape IPSA’s financial controls and confidence in decision making. Your actions & behaviours align to our values.

You’ll be an excellent communicator who can challenge constructively and can work with, and through, others to achieve results. You can manage multiple workstreams, maintaining your own, and your team’s performance. You adapt to changing situations and are proactive in responding to needs and priorities of others. You are aware of your limits and you know when to seek support and guidance. Resilience, performing well under pressure and responding constructively to setbacks don’t phase you.

A full person specification is available on our website.
 

Benefits:

  • Civil Service Pension
  • Generous starting holiday entitlement of 25 days + bank holidays, increasing by 1 day each year up to 30 days
  • Season ticket/rent deposit loans
  • Hybrid and flexible working by default, with occasional travel for team meetings
  • Access to learning and development tailored to your role
  • Working in a high-performing organisation
  • A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity with time to participate in workplace networks
  • Cycle to work scheme
  • Volunteering days

Our commitment and values We’re committed to making IPSA a more diverse and inclusive organisation and we choose to recruit, retain, and develop people with a diverse mix of skills and experience We are a highperforming organisation that values diversity and we live our values through all the work that we do. Our inclusive workplace environment welcomes people from all backgrounds and our ID, Green, Women’s and LGBTQIA+ networks signal our commitment to celebrating and promoting diversity, inclusion, and sustainability.

Our core values are Staying Connected, Seeing the Bigger Picture, Being Open, Doing the Right Thing and Making a Difference. If you share and live our values, then we would like to hear from you. We are a values-based organisation, and you can expect these to feature throughout the recruitment process and beyond.

 

How to apply:

If you are interested in applying for this role, please send your CV and a one-page cover letter and apply below now. We ask you to be succinct and to the point in your cover letter, highlighting why you’d be a great match, and it’s always a good idea focus this around some of your key achievements which might be relevant to this role.

We anticipate a high volume of applications for this role, and regretfully we will only be able to respond to you if you are shortlisted.
 

Interview process

Our interview and onboarding processes are virtual. If you want to join our team, you’ll need access to a secure WIFI network and a private space to work from. If you’re successful we will provide you with equipment for onboarding, training, and working from home.

If you are shortlisted, there will be a competency-based interview where we will ask you a series of questions designed to help the panel asses your suitability for the role and for IPSA and we may also ask you prepare a short presentation.

We expect to shortlist for this role in w/c 20th February, with interviews in w/c 27th February, although we may decide to conduct initial telephone interviews before that date, depending on the volume of applications.

 

Important information

We aim to keep our application window open for four weeks which means the closing date for this role will be Sunday 19th February. However, we will sift applications as they are submitted and therefore, we reserve the right to close the advert at any point after two weeks.

We expect to receive a high number of applications for this role, so we strongly advise you to apply before Sunday 12th February.
 

Privacy notice and right to work:

By applying you confirm you have the right to work in the UK and have read our Human Resources privacy notice - https://www.theipsa.org.uk/privacy