Rent and Service Charge Accountant

Milton Keynes City Council

Rent and Service Charge Accountant (Part Qualified)

Service: Finance

Reports to: Housing Finance Manager

Grade: I

Salary: £46,731 - £50,788

Working pattern: Hybrid (1 day per week in the office – Tuesdays)

Closing date: Sunday 1st September

Job Introduction

We’re seeking a strong communicator with housing finance experience to join us as Rent and Service Charge Accountant.

We have more than 11,000 council properties and our Housing Finance Team works closely with council housing services in a range of areas, from regeneration to home ownership. This means we get involved with many different projects; for instance, we’re currently building hundreds of new council properties in Bletchley as part of a wider regeneration programme. Every day is different.

As Rent and Service Charge Accountant, you’ll collaborate with colleagues to help ensure that our homes are safe, and costs are fully recovered for the services we provide, so that funds for future investment decisions are secured.

This role is ideal for someone with experience of setting rents and administering service charges in either a local authority or a registered provider and enjoys the challenges it brings.

Main Responsibility

• Lead on setting rents for Social Housing Tenants, temporary accommodation, and other categories of potential Tenants, ensuring full compliance with government rent setting policies and directions from the Regulator of Social Housing, such as the Rent Standard.
• Calculating and signing off rent and service charge agreements.
• Lead on and complete the estimated service charge process for tenants, leaseholders and shared owners from the calculation of charges to ensuring correct details are included in notifications to residents and these are printed and posted.
• Lead on and complete the actual service charge procedure, including the issuing of annual certified service charge certificates and statement of affairs for Leaseholders. Understanding of Major Works accounts would be beneficial.
• To be the point of contact for tenants, leaseholder, shared owners, internal and external auditors with any costing queries/audits.
• Actively promote Tenant and Leaseholder engagement around the service delivery and standards of services where the service is funded by way of service charges.
• Be inquisitive and challenging with the ability to apply innovative and creative thinking to service challenges within a fast-paced environment.

The Ideal Candidate

• Experience of setting rents and service charges for a Local Authority or Registered Provider
• Methodical, organised with attention to detail.
• Has good communication skills to engage with residents and colleagues from across the Council.
• Excellent spreadsheet skills and ability to undertake complex financial modelling using a different data sets and systems (financial, case management etc.).
• Part Qualified accountant (CCAB)

Package Description

In addition to your salary, we offer a range of benefits including:

• Great holiday benefits - most roles include 28 days annual leave every year on top of public (bank) holidays, increasing to 32 days after five years. In addition, there is a holiday purchase scheme allowing staff to purchase up to 5 additional days of leave each year.
• Excellent pension – everyone who works for us can join the national Local Government Pension Scheme, widely regarded as one of the best available.
• A full range of family friendly policies including enhanced maternity, adoption and paternity support and a childcare subsidy.
• Access to an award-winning employee benefits programme that includes a health cash plan, a low-cost bike purchase scheme as well as high street discounts and

Why join us? Along with more on our Benefits, discover why Working at the City Council could be the right move for you here Working at the Council | Milton Keynes

The Process

Milton Keynes City Council is working in partnership with Hammond Clarke in the recruitment of this role. For further information please contact Chris Macdonald on [email protected] or 0203 762 2207.