Job details

Job Purpose

The Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) is a major new tunnel beneath the river Thames along with new roads connecting Essex, Thurrock and Kent, providing much needed road capacity across the east of London for communities and freight to major ports for Europe and beyond.  It is one of the largest infrastructure projects in the country at £8.9bn and has been identified in the National Infrastructure Strategy as a key project.

This role reports to the LTC Finance Director and will work closely with Project Directors and Commercial & Cost Managers across the Project.

Financial Control is a critical aspect of project delivery and relies upon a tight working relationship between Project, Commercial and Finance leads so that roles and responsibilities are clear, information is shared and a ‘no surprises’ culture enabled. A key relationship is between Finance and Project Commercial Managers, who at a Project level are responsible for managing contracts, including controlling expenditure through those contracts.

Detailed responsibilities are set out below but at a more strategic level the LTC Financial Controller will take ownership of Finance and Finance related issues across the LTC Project to enable deliver within estimates and approved funding.

An important part of this will be managing the relationship with the central Financial Control and Capital Programme Management divisions so that all accounting and tax issues are fully understood, and the project set up for success.

Leading a small team, they will be a key member of the management team of this part of National Highways.

The main duties and responsibilities of the Financial Controller would be to:

• Own the LTC financial forecasting and reporting process, ensuring alignment to the National Highways corporate processes and procedures and communicating these to Commercial & Project Managers. Ensure there is an agreed commentary for any changes to the forecast.
• Work closely with the Commercial team to assure the cost forecasts and actuals are as accurate as possible. Work collaboratively with Commercial colleagues to find solutions for the project.
• Lead the presentation of the forecasts at the LTC Quarterly forecasts reviews and agree quarterly signed off of forecasts with the LTC Executive Director.
• Lead the Annual Budget setting process across LTC and coordinate with the National Highways Financial Control and CPM divisions.
• Prepare the monthly LTC Financial Performance report and contribute to the overall LTC Performance Report.
• Working with project Sponsors and the Sponsorship Director to prepare financial information to support investment decision papers ensuring financial information is presented accurately and aligned to NH protocols and financial accounting policies.
• Ensure the Commercial Director understands and supports any changes required of the project commercial leads to support period end accounting transactions (accruals, prepayments, provisions) and that evidence can be provided to auditors when requested.
• Manage any Oracle – Prism interface issues.
• Ensure VAT accounting on projects is correct and sufficient supporting evidence is available for audit and HMRC purposes.
• Ensure the finance section of the LTC Business Case is prepared in line with government guidance for tier 1 projects and best practice.
• Coordinate the year-end statutory audit process.
• Coordinate approvals for special payments, advance payments and contingent liabilities.

Key stakeholders are:

• LTC Executive & Programme Directors
• LTC Project Directors
• LTC Commercial Director
• Peers across the National Highways Finance Directorate
• Director of Financial Control
• CFO

You’ll have:

• Experience of the financial management and control of significant infrastructure projects.
• An understanding of governance requirements for Government Tier 1 schemes.
• Experience of building relationships with senior stakeholders as well as commercial and delivery functions within an organisation.
• Significant personal impact and presentational skills with the ability to work at both a detailed and summary level depending upon each stakeholder.
• Qualified Accountant.
• Experience of project accounting and understanding of earned value management.
• Knowledge of industry standard accounting software packages.

If this role sounds like something that you would be interested in, please click the link to apply or get in touch with Christopher.black@publicsectorresourcing.co.uk

Disability confident

As a member of the disability confident scheme, Highways England guarantees to interview all candidates who have a disability and who meet all the essential criteria for the vacancy. In cases where we have a high volume of candidates who have a disability who meet all the essential criteria, we will interview the best candidates from within that group.

If you qualify for the above, please notify us on PSRapplications@publicsectorresourcing.co.uk

We will be in touch to discuss your suitability and arrange your Guaranteed Interview.

Should you require reasonable adjustments at any point during the recruitment process or if there is a more accessible way for us to communicate, please do let me know.

In applying for this role you acknowledge the following, this role falls in scope of the Off Payroll Working in the Public Sector legislation. Any rates of payment quoted will reflect the gross rate per day for the assignment and will be subject to appropriate taxes and statutory costs. As such the payment to the intermediary and your income resulting from this contract will be different.

Please be aware that this role can only be worked within the UK and not Overseas.