Family Services/Localities - Business Support Officer

We are looking for an experienced administrator with a background in finance and a passion for working within local government family services. In this essential role, you'll be at the heart of financial administration for children in care and foster placements, managing vendor relations, purchase orders, payments, and ensuring smooth financial processes across the board. Your new role

• Purchase Order Management: Process purchase orders for external suppliers, particularly those related to care providers and child placement services. Ensure timely and accurate payment processing for all invoices.
• Financial Monitoring: Track expenditures against budgets, monitor financial commitments, and ensure the effective and intended use of financial resources. Regularly update financial records and ensure they are accessible for management feedback and decision-making.
• Administrative Support: Provide general administrative support, including maintaining records, managing documents, handling correspondence, and supporting the day-to-day operations of the finance team.
• Bank Payments & Reconciliation: Handle regular bank payments, ensuring accurate coding and recording in both the IBC system and Mosaic.
• Supplier Queries & Disputes: Manage queries and resolve disputes with suppliers, service users, and other external parties in a professional and customer-focused manner.
• Corporate Credit Card Management: Purchase goods using the corporate credit card and reconcile monthly statements, ensuring accurate cost coding.
• Budget Monitoring: Monitor financial resources closely and provide sound financial and administrative advice to staff and service users to ensure optimal use of available funds.
• Supplier Setup & Enquiries: Manage the setup of new suppliers/vendors on the IBC system and handle any supplier enquiries in a timely and effective manner.
• Regular Payments: Ensure that essential payments such as subsistence, travel, and staying-put payments are made weekly to young people in care and their carers.
• Data Collection & Reporting: Collect, collate, and analyse financial data to assist in statutory planning, commissioning, and monitoring purposes.
• HMRC Reporting: Follow procedures to inform HMRC when a child has been looked after by the local authority for eight consecutive weeks or more and ensure all relevant circumstances are updated.

What you'll need to succeed

• Local Government Experience: Experience within family services or the public sector is essential. A background in finance or administration is highly desirable.
• Vendor & Supplier Management: You'll be working with vendors who provide care and child placement services. A softer approach is necessary when liaising with these organisations to ensure smooth communication and timely financial transactions.
• Attention to Detail: Accuracy is crucial, especially when managing payments, purchase orders, and financial records. A keen eye for detail is essential to maintaining data integrity and avoiding discrepancies.
• Financial Acumen: While this role is not purely finance-focused, a solid understanding of finance processes, budgeting, and payment tracking will be needed to perform effectively in this position.
• Communication Skills: You'll need to communicate effectively with social workers, suppliers, and service users, ensuring all requests and approvals are handled professionally and promptly.
• Ability to Handle Disputes: Resolving supplier or service user disputes requires patience, diplomacy, and problem-solving skills.
• Proficiency with Systems: Experience with systems like IBC and Mosaic, or the ability to quickly learn them, will be highly beneficial.

What you'll get in return

• Full-Time Role: 36 hours per week.
• Hybrid working arrangement after initial training and on boarding (2-3 days working from home per week).
• On-site office work is required during training and when managing in-person tasks.

What you need to do nowIf you're interested in this role, click apply now to forward an up-to-date copy of your CV, or call us now.If this job isn't quite right for you, but you are looking for a new position, please contact us for a confidential discussion about your career.

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