Finance And Budget Assistant

Org. Setting and Reporting

The Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) is a global intergovernmental treaty aimed at the conservation and sustainable use of migratory species and their habitats. Numerous additional intergovernmental instruments on migratory species conservation have been adopted under the broad umbrella of CMS which are supported by the CMS Secretariat. The CMS Secretariat also provides the Secretariat for the Agreement on the Conservation of Small Cetaceans of the Baltic, North East Atlantic, Irish and North Seas (ASCOBANS). In addition, two regional agreements on migratory species adopted under CMS have independent Secretariats which are co-located with the CMS Secretariat in Bonn – the African Eurasian Waterbird Agreement (AEWA) and the Agreement on the Conservation of European Populations of Bats (EUROBATS). The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is the United Nations system’s designated entity for addressing environmental issues at the global and regional level. Its mandate is to coordinate the development of environmental policy consensus by keeping the global environment under review and bringing emerging issues to the attention of governments and the international community for action. In the present context, UNEP provides the administrative functions for the CMS, AEWA and EUROBATS Secretariats. This post is located at the Bonn duty station in Germany and is a part of the Administrative and Fund Management Unit of the CMS Secretariat. Under the overall supervision of the Executive Secretary and the day-to-day supervision of the Administrative Officer, the incumbent will be responsible for the following functions:

Responsibilities

Budget:

• Provides support with respect to the review, analyses and preparation of the medium-term plan and its revisions.
• Prepares supporting documents (narrative report and supporting tables) with respect to finalization of cost estimates and budget proposals, in terms of staff and non-staff requirements.
• Assists managers and Administrative Officer in the elaboration of resource requirements for budget preparations.
• Undertakes research and provides support to Administrative Officer with respect to budget reviews of relevant Governing bodies of the Convention and associated Agreements.
• Monitors expenditures and compares with approved budget; prepares adjustments as necessary.
• Reviews requisitions for goods and services to ensure correct objects of expenditure have been charged, and availability of funds.
• Assists in preparation of budget performance submissions and finalization of budget performance reports, analyzing variances between approved budgets and actual expenditures.
• Verifies accuracy of input data, ensuring consistency of data in previous allotments to new allotments issued.
• Co-ordinates with other finance and budget staff on related issues during preparation of budget reports.
• Extracts and analyses data across full range of finance and budget functions, including programme development and database management.
• Monitors integrity of various financial databases.

Payments:

• Reviews incoming payment instructions.
• Prepares payments for final disbursement by Cashier.
• Checks deposits for all incoming funds for voluntary contributions and assessed contributions.
• Notifies payees of status of payments.
• Assists staff members, Administrative Officer, business partners and donors regarding queries on payment and deposit-related issues.
• Assists Administrative Officer in cash management, including cash flow forecasts.
• Liaises with Treasury regarding outstanding payment items and payment instructions.
• Checks complaints of non-receipt.
• Files and archives as required.

General:

• Keeps up-to-date on documents/reports/guidelines that have a bearing on matters related to programme, ensuring compliance with Governing bodies recommendations and decisions as well as with United Nations policies and procedures.
• Drafts or prepares correspondence to respond to enquiries in respect to relevant financial and budget matters.
• Maintain and keep up-to-date files.
• Assists with the collection and analysis of data as well as preparation of data presentations and reports for information sharing, responding to queries, knowledge management, planning and decision making.
• Assists with visualizations and updating information material such as web pages or brochures.
• Performs other related duties, as assigned.

Education

• Completion of high school diploma or equivalent is required.

Job – Specific Qualification

• Supplemental training in Administration, Finance or related field is required.

Work Experience

• A minimum of seven (7) years of progressive responsible experience in finance, budget, accounting, administrative services or related area is required. Experience in budget or finance with the United Nations or other comparable international organization is required. Experience working with Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system such as SAP or similar is required. Experience in budgeting and analyzing financial reports is desirable. Experience in identifying and resolving financial data discrepancies and operational problems is desirable. One (1) year or more of experience in data analytics or related area is desirable.

Languages

• English and French are the working languages of the United Nations Secretariat. For the post advertised, fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official United Nations language is desirable. NOTE: “Fluency equals a rating of “fluent” in all four areas (read, write, speak, understand) and “knowledge of” equals a rating of “confident” in two of the four areas.

Source: https://careers.un.org/jobSearchDescription/240876?language=en