Finance Assistant - Debt Collection - Permanent

This position is an Anywhere Worker role with the expectation the successful worker will attend County Hall, Chelmsford one day per week, with the set team day being a Tuesday. 

Interview Date: W/C the 8^th of December. 

The Opportunity 

Purchase to Pay (P2P) and Income aims to provide a comprehensive financial transactional and support service, maximising new and innovative technology to provide excellent customer service using a multi skilled workforce. 

Working within Income Collection in order to maximise the income generated for Services in Adult Social Care at Essex County Council, alongside ensuring effective recovery of aged debt. Finance Assistants will work with customers to ensure that their invoices for Adult Social Care services are paid promptly with a view to arranging automated future payments including direct debits. 

Experienced in working as a team member across a flexible and multi skilled workforce, delivering excellent customer service. You will need to manage and respond to customer queries to seek resolution. 

Knowledge of Income Collection processes is desirable but not essential as full training will be provided. The role requires good interpersonal and communication skills to deliver excellent customer service. 

Accountabilities 

• Ensure effective recovery of Adult Social Care Income
• Work towards effectively building key stakeholder relationships and effectively managing conversations in order to resolve debt issues.
• Contribute towards delivery of Key KPI’s in delivering the above requirements in an effective, compassionate, and compliant manner.
• Effective in managing queries and disputes in order to ensure effective resolutions.
• Negotiating payments and promoting automated processes to service users, in order to reduce the likelihood of repeated debts.
• Contributes to the delivery of the business plan for financial transactions, in support of the wider organisational vision.
• Responsible for processing and managing financial transactions, following defined business processes, inputting, and interpreting data to ensure quality, consistency, accuracy, timeliness, and high performance.
• Responsible for delivering all activities to meet defined deadlines, proactively reporting any risks or issues for early resolution.
• Provides support and guidance to internal and external customers in a professional manner, in line with financial processes, ensuring that policy and legislation are met.
• Carries out basic reporting, which contributes to the management of organisational performance, maximises income and ensures compliance with Financial Regulations and ECC Policies.
• Work flexibly and collaboratively across P2P and Income to deliver finance support.
• Recommend process improvements and redesign to achieve best practice and organisational efficiency.
• Contributes to maintaining currency on legislation changes and translating these into local policy and procedure, to identify and review potential changes in technology.
• Specific individual and shared targets and objectives are defined annually within the performance management framework. 

The Experience You Will Bring 

Essential: 

• Excellent Communication and Interpersonal skills are essential as well as an ability to build and establish relationships.
• A good telephone manner is needed along with a firm, fair and friendly approach.
• Ability to deliver effective, administrative duties; well organised, reliable, and able to meet deadlines, whilst appropriately handling confidential and sensitive information.
• Level of good competency using Microsoft office packages including, Outlook, Word, and Excel. 

Desirable: 

• Credit Control/Debt Collection experience.
• Some knowledge of P2P/Income systems and demonstrable accounts. payable, accounts receivable, purchase to pay and e-invoicing experience would be desirable.
• Negotiation Skills

To read more about our business area, please visit: Corporate Services and Transformation

Why Essex?

As one of the largest and most dynamic UK local authorities, Essex offers a stimulating public service environment. Covering over 1,420 square miles and serving 1.8 million residents, we’re committed to transformational change and delivering better quality at lower cost. Recognised in the top three of the latest IMPOWER index for productivity, we ensure everyone matters in Everyone's Essex. With flexible working options and a focus on innovation, whether you are looking to develop your career or contribute to the local community, Essex is the ideal place for you.

In February 2025, Greater Essex was accepted onto the Government’s devolution priority programme, which will see local authorities in Essex work towards establishing a Mayoral Combined County Authority by May 2026. You can read more about devolution and local government reorganisation (LGR) on our careers site.

Essex County Council is proud to be a Disability Confident Leader. We’re committed to interview all disabled applicants who choose to apply under our Job Interview Scheme if they meet the minimum requirements of the job. Please speak to our Recruiters if you require any reasonable adjustments during the process. We’re also committed to interview all veterans and care leavers, who meet the minimum requirements of the role for which they are applying.

Once you’ve secured your role within Essex County Council you will receive many great employee benefits, including support for unpaid carers and flexible working arrangements to accommodate their needs.

At Essex County Council, we value integrity and ethical behaviour. We kindly ask that you embrace our code of conduct and the Nolan principles, including throughout the recruitment process. Your commitment to these standards helps us maintain a positive and respectful workplace for everyone.

As part of employment with Essex County Council (ECC) should your role require a DBS check you will be required to register with the DBS update service. The DBS update service ensures all registered DBS certificates are kept up to date and allows authorised parties to view the status of your certificate. This is an annual subscription, and you will be responsible for ensuring this is maintained. For further information on the DBS update service please go to https://www.gov.uk/dbs-update-service

Essex County Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults, and expects all employees and volunteers to share this commitment.

If you would like to be kept up to date on other relevant opportunities, blogs, news, events and industry related news at Essex County Council, please join The Essex Talent Community

If you have queries on this role or require anything further, please email daniel.warner@essex.gov.uk

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