I'm looking for

Job Summary:

KPMG’s Restructuring Employer Covenant Review Team are looking for an Assistant Manager to join our expanding National team, with this role based in London.

The Restructuring Employer Covenant team is currently made up of approximately 15 people, led by a partner and three directors. The team is targeting significant growth over the next few years.

Work in this specific role centres on assessing the financial strength of the companies that are responsible for funding defined benefit pension schemes, and assessing how much these companies can afford to pay to their schemes to meet the funding shortfall.

Our work is hands on – as well as producing concise reports, we are in the boardroom providing direct strategic and negotiation support, and then implementing our recommendations.

We work for both trustees and corporates, including some of the largest and most complex businesses in the UK. Our work falls into three areas:

1) Assessing the financial strength of the business supporting the scheme for the trustees or helping the corporate present their financial strength to their scheme trustees/advisors;

2) Assessing the impact of corporate activity on the level of financial support offered to the scheme – e.g. understanding the impact of M&A activity, business reorganisations, refinancings, etc. Again, we work for both corporates and trustees, often helping to design and implement structures and solutions; and

3) Dealing with situations where the size of the scheme threatens the ability of the sponsoring company/group to be able to continue to trade. This requires innovative solutions, robust financial analysis and excellent negotiation skills.

We are part of KPMG’s core Restructuring practise and work closely with other parts of KPMG including Pensions Advisory, Transaction Services, Corporate Finance and various sector teams. In many situations, a multi-functional team is deployed.

The role requires strong accounting analysis, report writing skills and a commercial mind-set. This position would represent an exciting opportunity to make a first move into an Advisory role following qualification.

Applicants should be ready to work in a dynamic, flexible and fast paced environment. We work with a wide variety of clients, from small privately owned enterprises through to FTSE 100 and high profile businesses. Applicants should expect to work across all sectors.


Key Responsibilities:

To be an effective Assistant Manager within the Employer Covenant team, and in this role specifically, you will undertake the following:

- Assist in helping our team build strong, trusted adviser relationships with senior management and other key stakeholders during engagements (including trustees, solicitors and actuaries);
- Manage your role on engagements and projects to scope, time, quality and budget complying with KPMG engagement management practices;
- Appraise situations (which can be challenging & fast developing) and support the senior engagement team in looking to develop innovative solutions, assessing options for businesses and/or stakeholders;
- Communicate views and insights (both in writing and verbally) in an effective and compelling manner to clients and KPMG colleagues, able to adjust style to circumstances;
- Support on the design and development of client ready deliverables with oversight from Managers which will include;
- - The drafting of PowerPoint reports and presentations, meeting notes and advice notes; and
- - Taking responsibility for the preparation of Excel “data books”, analysing client financial information which is likely to include (but is not limited to) historical and forecast profit and loss, balance sheet and cash flow information.
- Involvement in business development activities, including developing pitches and proposals to win new work.
Key skills and competencies required:

- Strong commercial and business acumen, with evidence of experience;
- Ability to work innovatively and ‘self-start’;
- Desire to build wide advisory expertise and develop knowledge of the team’s offerings;
- Ability to communicate well with operational and financial staff at all levels;
- Good time management and organisational skills, together with the ability to prioritise tasks;
- An ability to produce high quality, detailed and accurate work, and produce concise and creative reports and presentations – support would be given to further develop these skills. However a working knowledge of Microsoft PowerPoint is desirable, with intermediate Excel skill being a necessity;
- Enjoy working in a dynamic, flexible and fast paced project environment;
- Willingness to embrace work across all sectors;
- Willingness to undertake some travel, albeit this is typically limited to day trips; and
- Developing financial and analytical skills, with relevant accountancy qualification.
Prior experience of undertaking employer covenant work is not essential. Up front training and continuous coaching will be provided.

The Role

KPMG’s Restructuring team are looking for a Cashier to join their team.

The team of trusted advisors offer a full range of services to stressed and distressed businesses, ranging from formal insolvency through to advising profitable businesses on enhancing value and solving issues.

This role will be focusing purely on dealing with all aspects of cashiering work arising on our insolvency engagements, with the ideal candidate ideally bringing existing experience directly working in this field.

The successful candidate will be based within the Midlands but will join our national cashiering team supporting on engagements across the country, and have a line manager within this group.


Responsibilities

The successful candidate will be responsible for the following key tasks:

- Ensuring cheques received are recorded correctly, banked and inputted into IPS (Insolvency Practitioners System) within the timescales set out in our cash procedures.
- Importing and processing of all available bank transactions files. Monitoring any automatically produced ‘direct receipts’ and ensuring these are dealt with promptly.
- Producing and processing ISA and CHAPS/faster payments.
- Printing of cheques including distributions for home region and when necessary across other areas.
- Ensuring that all the above payment types have the correct backing documentation and are coded correctly.
- Processing bank transfer and journal transactions, ensuring that the correct backing documentation is attached and correct coding has been used.
- Monitoring ‘other actions’ to ensure transactions are dealt with within the correct timescale and liaising with engagement teams regarding any outstanding transactions.
- Proactively managing the case load to spot and avoid any arising issues and troubleshoot those with engagement leaders and managers.
- Reviewing reports to ensure all estate bank accounts are reconciled on a monthly basis and there are no late statutory returns.
- Closing estate bank accounts.
- Archiving IPS cases, ensuring all diary lines are signed off, bank accounts are closed and VAT journals have been completed.
- Liaising with banks and building relationships.
- Troubleshooting bank related issues.
- Being one of the first points of contact for staff with IPS/TPS and cashiering related queries.

The Person

The key skills required are:

- Several years’ experience in a Restructuring cashiering role is required
- Knowledge and experience of IPS is required; additional training would be provided on other required systems.
- Highly organised and have an ability to prioritise effectively.
- To have the flexibility to be able to respond to sudden and sharp changes in workload.
- Common sense and an eye for detail/accuracy.
- Excellent communication skills and the ability to remain calm and professional in times of stress.
- The confidence and ability to challenge more senior staff and correct coding and/or procedural errors identified.

KPMG’s Personal Debt Solutions team in Scotland provide advice and debt solutions to individuals who are struggling to manage their unsecured debts.

As a market leading debt solutions provider, our team administers a large portfolio of personal insolvency cases, including both Trust Deed and sequestration appointments. We also act as Continuing Money Adviser under the Debt Arrangement Scheme.

Due to increased case numbers, we need to recruit an administrative assistant to support our operational teams. This role will be based in our flagship office in St Vincent Plaza, Glasgow and will be full time. Hours would generally be 9am to 5pm Monday to Friday however, some flexibility is possible. This role would be ideal for a recent school leaver or for someone looking for their first role in an office environment.

This is a fantastic opportunity to be part of our hard working, customer focussed team within an established, successful and growing operation.

The Responsibilities

You will be exposed to a large number of cases within the personal debt solutions team and will responsible for dealing with various aspects of administration including opening the mail, sending out bulk letters and ensuring that cases are compliant with statutory regulation and internal procedures. You will be part of a team of between 4 and 6 individuals reporting directly to your team manager.

Your responsibilities within the team will be varied and you will deal with multiple aspects of case administration including:-

•Opening the mail and ensuring that it is effectively scanned and distributed to the team;
•Preparing and sending out circular letters to third parties;
•Answering calls and ensuring that queries are dealt with effectively;
•Making outbound calls to creditors to confirm outstanding balances;
•Following statutory procedures and internal guidance to ensure deadlines are met and sound compliance is achieved;
•Inputting data to our internal administration systems;
•Producing standard responses to letters and emails received from the debtor, creditors, solicitors and other interested parties;
•Maintaining documentation via the electronic document management system in accordance with the department file structure.
•In addition, you will be required to undertake administration and projects specific to personal insolvency as directed.

The Individual

You should:-

•be highly organised and capable of dealing with multiple tasks and responsibilities;
•have a high level of attention to detail and accuracy;
•have a professional and positive telephone manner;
•be able to demonstrate the ability to work well as part of a team;
•be IT literate with experience of using Microsoft Word and Excel;

Training in relation to the systems used by the team to manage our case load and on the available and appropriate debt solutions will be provided.

Candidates must have at least 5 National 4s including Maths and English.

You may have previous experience of working in an office environment, but this is not essential.

The Team


Organisations across all industries are using financial and data models of increasing complexity in key decision making areas such as project evaluation, investment appraisals, on-going operational and financial reporting purposes.


The roles are within the Modelling team based in London, Canary Wharf. We provide a wide range of modelling services to our clients in a diverse range of sectors such as transport, infrastructure, communications, health energy / natural resources, financial services, leisure, retail and manufacturing. Our modelling services include:


• business planning and forecasting;
• modelling the impacts of business restructuring, including options analysis, cost optimisation, outsourcing and other operational and financial restructuring;
• transaction modelling (mergers & acquisitions, buyouts, refinancing, bids and bid defence);
• management and KPI reporting solutions;
• data analysis and presentation;
• model risk assessment;
• model assurance;
• financial model best practice reviews


We work closely with teams across all functions within KPMG such as Transaction Services, Corporate Finance, Restructuring, Tax, Performance Management, Financial Management, Financial Risk Management, Internal Audit and Regulatory and Compliance Services. We work on some of the most exciting projects in KPMG, delivering high quality, flexible and bespoke analytics and modelling solutions for our clients.


The Role


We are looking for advisors to join our team and work in all of the areas referred to above. The successful candidate, after undergoing KPMG’s rigorous training programme, will start working on best practice reviews and model assurance under the guidance of senior staff. This role offers the candidate the opportunity to develop an extensive knowledge of Financial Modelling that would complement their existing strong accounting, finance and Excel skills, whilst also developing client-facing skills, project management skills and consulting skills. As the candidate’s familiarity with best practice financial modelling increases, they will be given the opportunity to work on business and transaction modelling projects with senior staff. The candidate will be expected to pass on this knowledge to more junior analysts through mentoring and on-the-job training.

The role requires working to deadlines, prioritising workload, project management and providing a high level of client service at all times. The level of responsibility you will be given will only be limited by your own aptitude and willingness to learn and to take on new challenges.


The Person


• A first-class or upper second-class degree that included finance and accounting modules
• Holds or is working towards a post graduate degree (Masters, PhD, CFA)
• Holds the ACA qualification, or close to being awarded the ACA qualification

Experience and Skills


• Experience of working in a Financial Modelling role with an understanding of financial and accounting concepts or project finance (e.g. debt structures, cash waterfalls, financial ratios) working with Financial Sector clients
• A high degree of knowledge of Excel
• Experience of producing Financial Models using VBA and Excel
• Experience of managing junior staff
• Experience of interacting with senior management
• Experience in describing complex technical issues in a clear non-technical way
• Initiative, enthusiasm and excellent communication skills (verbal and written)
• Strong analytical and interpretative skills
• Ability to quickly assimilate and apply new techniques and knowledge