Role: Technical Accountant Closedown Review REF 1767504
Contract Length: Until 31 December 2026
Location: Fully remote
IR35: Inside
Pay Rate to Intermediary: TBC
Spinwell is recruiting for a Technical Accountant Closedown Review for an excellent opportunity within the public sector.
RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE TECHNICAL ACCOUNTANT CLOSEDOWN REVIEW
- Existing revenue closedown processes and procedures
- Existing capital closedown processes and procedures
- Overall ownership and leadership of the closedown process
- Roles, responsibilities and accountability across the finance team
- Previous years' performance in delivering final accounts within statutory deadlines
- Closedown timetables and allocation of workload
- Technical accounting capability and capacity within the team
- Closedown team structure, knowledge and experience
- Finance system and technical issues impacting accounts production
- Quality, sign-off procedures and consistency of working papers
- Filing structures and document management arrangements
- Maintenance of key control accounts and balance sheet reconciliations throughout the financial year
- Capital accounting processes and maintenance of the Fixed Asset Register
- Lessons learned from previous closedowns both internally and across the wider local government sector
- Issues identified by Internal Audit and External Audit
- Findings arising from the independent review of Bromsgrove District Council's 2025/26 unaudited Statement of Accounts
- Processes used to extract financial information from the finance system for accounts production
- Data quality, system access and availability of information
- Spreadsheet controls and master workbook version control
- Identification and treatment of prior year adjustments
- Hard close procedures and controls over general ledger amendments
- Audit trails for journals and late adjustments
- Year-end accruals processes
- Accounting treatment and coding of grants
- Review and clearance of historic commitments
- Budget monitoring arrangements, virements, approvals and audit trails
- Timely completion of asset valuations and revaluations
- Pension accounting arrangements and timeliness of actuarial information
- Timely receipt of third-party information required for accounts production
- Governance and frequency of closedown meetings
- Compliance with the CIPFA Code of Practice
- Completion and quality assurance of the CIPFA Disclosure Checklist
- Opportunities to streamline and modernise accounts production
- Strengthening balance sheet assurance arrangements
- Improving preparedness for external audit
- Management oversight, review and assurance processes
SKILLS/EXPERIENCE OF THE TECHNICAL ACCOUNTANT CLOSEDOWN REVIEW
- Applicants must be fully qualified CCAB accountants (CIPFA, ACCA, ACA, CIMA or equivalent) and possess a minimum of five years' post-qualification experience.
- Extensive Local Government finance experience
- Significant year-end closedown experience
- Production and review of Statements of Accounts
- Strong technical accounting knowledge within a local authority environment
- Experience of capital accounting, fixed assets and balance sheet management
- Experience working with external auditors and resolving audit queries
- Strong understanding of the CIPFA Code of Practice and local authority accounting requirements
- Ability to review existing processes, identify improvements and implement best practice
- Experience operating at, or supporting, Chief Accountant level
- This assignment would suit experienced Interim Chief Accountants, Technical Accountants, Financial Reporting Managers, Corporate Finance Managers or other senior local government finance professionals with a strong background in financial reporting, closedown and audit.
If you are a Technical Accountant Closedown Review, apply now or send your CV to Spinwell!
We welcome all applications regardless of background, in line with our commitment to diversity, equality and inclusion.
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