Strong financial controls. Smooth financial operations. Delivering at a fast pace.

Financial Control Accountant

£34,000 - £39,000 (+ Benefits & Study Support)

Reports to: Financial Control Manager

Department: Chief Operating Office

Contract: Permanent

Hours: Full time 35 hours per week

Location: Stratford, London. Office-based with high flexibility (1-2 days per week in the office)

Visa sponsorship: You must be eligible to work in the UK to apply for this vacancy. Cancer Research UK is not able to offer visa sponsorship. 

Closing date: 24 August 2024 23:55

This vacancy may close earlier if a high volume of applications is received or once a suitable candidate is found, therefore we strongly recommend that you apply early to avoid disappointment. If you require more time to apply as part of a reasonable adjustment, please contact [email protected] as soon as possible.

Recruitment process: One competency-based interview

Interview date: From the week commencing 02 September 2024

How do I apply? We operate an anonymised shortlisting process in our commitment to equality, diversity, and inclusion. CVs are required for all applications; but we won’t be able to view them until we invite you for an interview. Instead, we ask you to fully complete the work history section of the online application form for us to be able to assess you quickly, fairly, and objectively.

At Cancer Research UK, we exist to beat cancer.

We are professionals with purpose, beating cancer every day. But we need to go much further and much faster. That’s why we’re looking for someone talented, someone who wants to develop their skills, someone like you.

Cancer Research UK’s Finance team’s credibility and professionalism in handling income fundraised by public generosity is essential to the smooth running of our organisation. As a large, complex organisation with an income of £719m per annum, nearly 600+ shops, c.570 yearly events, a large operational organisation of c.4,000 people, and five research laboratories it is essential we have strong financial controls across the organisation while also ensuring the smooth financial operations and performance of the charity.

As a Financial Control Accountant, you will support the Financial Control Manager to ensure that our financial control framework is robust across Cancer Research UK and our entities (e.g., Cancer Research Horizons and Centre for Drug Development ). This will involve partnering with teams across Finance and Procurement to support projects aimed at improving the effectiveness of our internal controls, driving efficiencies; and ‘automating, standardising, simplifying or eliminating’ our processes. You will also play a key role in producing, refining, and coordinating the balance sheet reconciliation process; and in supporting the year-end audit by producing the annual report and accounts, and addressing audit control findings and weaknesses.

If you are a part-qualified Accountant (CIMA/ACCA/ICAEW or equivalent) who has delivered balance sheet reconciliations and supported the year-end audit process within a large organisation, we would love for you to join our mission.

What will I be doing?

• Support on improvement and change projects ensuring strong internal controls and mitigating fraud.

• Supporting our aim to ‘automate, standardise, simplify or eliminate’ financial processes.

• Partnering with teams across Finance to address internal and external audit control findings and weaknesses identified while ensuring audit findings are closed in a timely manner.

• Inputting into internal control monitoring tools such as exception reporting, monitoring audit logs, and checking appropriate segregation of duties are in place.

• Refining and producing timely balance sheet reconciliations ensuring strong balance sheet controls are in place and items are cleared to agreed service levels.

• Ensuring balance sheet processes are documented and changes are maintained and updated accordingly.

• Coordinating the balance sheet process ensuring reconciling items have delegated owners and actions; and are cleared on time.

• Assisting with the automation of reconciliations while utilising reconciliation software and exploring opportunities to utilise robotic process automation (RPA).

• Supporting the year-end audit which will involve producing the annual report and accounts, and providing balance sheet reconciliations and financial notes to auditors.

What skills will I need?

• Actively studying part-qualified Accountant (CIMA/ACCA/ICAEW or equivalent).

• Experience working in a finance department (this does not need to be in a Financial Control team).

• Has delivered balance sheet reconciliations within a large organisation.

• Participated in, and contributed to, the year-end audit process.

• Knowledge of financial reporting standards (we use Charity SORP but welcome applicants without this, e.g. IFRS, FRS 101, FRS 105 etc).

• Ability to communicate and collaborate with internal teams and stakeholders to deliver strong financial controls.

• Drives continuous process efficiencies and improvements with strong attention to detail and financial controls.

• Strong Excel skills (comfortable using formulas, pivot tables, summifs, and vlookups).

Our organisation values are designed to guide all that we do.

Bold: Act with ambition, courage and determination  

Credible: Act with rigour and professionalism   

Human: Act to have a positive impact on people  

Together: Act inclusively and collaboratively

We’re looking for people who can believe in and embody these organisation values and can use them to drive forward progress against our mission to beat cancer.

If you’re interested in applying and excited about working with us but are unsure if you have the right skills and experience we’d still love to hear from you.

What will I gain?

We create a working environment that supports your wellbeing and provide a generous benefits package, a wide range of career and personal development opportunities and high-quality tools. Our policies and processes enable you to improve your work-life balance, take positive steps in your career and achieve your personal wellbeing goals.

You can explore our benefits by visiting our careers web page.

Additional Information

If you want to know more about this role, here is a full job description. Please note this is a generalist profile used for internal & external purposes meaning we don’t expect candidates to meet all the criteria included (we will be shortlisting based on the essential criteria advertised).

For more information about working with us please visit our website or contact us at [email protected].  

For more updates on our work and careers, follow us on: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, X and YouTube.

Our vision is to create a charity where everyone feels like they belong, benefits from and participates in, the work we do. We actively encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and cultures, in particular those from ethnic minority backgrounds who are currently under-represented.

We want to see every candidate performing at their best throughout the job application process, interview process and whilst at work. We therefore ask you to inform us of any concerns you have or any adjustments you might need to enable this to happen. Please contact [email protected] or 020 3469 8400 as soon as possible. 

Unfortunately, we are unable to recruit anyone below the age of 18, so that we can protect young people from health & safety and safeguarding risks.