We’re offering an exciting opportunity for a qualified accountant with deep experience in both investment accounting and unit pricing to join our Financial Operations team. We’re looking for a technically strong Investment Operations leader who has overseen unit pricing, dealing (trade placement) and core investment operations processes within a life & pensions environment, ideally with hands on experience of a recognised investment administration system.
In this role, you’ll combine day to day oversight with leading a focused programme of operational improvements. You’ll drive straight through processing, strengthen investment accounting and unit pricing controls, streamline processes, optimise treasury workflows, and help define best practice and our target operating model for investment operations and investment accounting.
Alongside day-to-day oversight, you’ll lead month-end investment accounting processes, reconciliations, and the delivery of quarterly investment reporting to Group Financial Reporting.
We’re looking for someone who can move seamlessly between technical detail and strategic improvement, bringing a structured, delivery-focused approach across project management, business analysis, and process redesign — along with a genuine passion for continuous improvement.
If you’ve led both unit pricing and fund accounting functions and are motivated by building a future-ready investment operations capability, this role offers the opportunity to make a meaningful and lasting impact.
What you will do
- Assume responsibility for the daily investment operations processes including appropriations, trade placement, treasury, unit pricing and fund valuation.
- Act as the senior professional in the team, reviewing all inputs into the ledger originating from investment and treasury systems, signing off reconciliations and enhancing and developing, through organic process design, a robust and effective control environment.
- Enhance strategic capability within the Investment Operations area through the delivery of a significant process improvement and change portfolio including a system upgrade; delivering a catalogue of identified best practice procedural improvements and enhancing controls and operational processes such as fund tax, fund rebates and box management.
- Assume responsibility for all investment accounting and reporting tasks, acting as a subject matter expert for the accounting of unit-linked funds and retail investment products.
- Take a lead in internal projects such as deep dives into asset liability matching reconciliations, shareholder and policyholder dual accounting, intrafund and intercompany positions and reviewing rebate arrangements on managed portfolios.
- Deliver organic idea generation, actionable management insights and best practice recommendations as pertains to all things Investment Operations and Treasury; exploring automation, API’s, SFTP integrations and onboarding of systems to reduce and eliminate dependency on manual processes.
- Support key stakeholders in the wider business to understand and interpret financial results, management information and contribute to regulatory reporting outputs e.g. Solvency II reporting.
Working hours are 35 hours a week Monday to Friday. Start times are flexible from 8.30am to 9.30am. After a successful training period there is flexibility to work from home for 3 days a week.
What we require
- Significant experience in an investment accounting and reporting function; familiarity with unit linked funds and retail investment products.
- Experience of working in a unit pricing environment for a life insurer or professional services provider including hands-on systems experience with an Investment System (e.g. InvestPro, pControl, HiPortfolio).
- Strong reconciliation experience including; control account reconciliations, trade and settlement reconciliations, variance analysis and root cause analysis.
- A good understanding and appreciation of financial and operational controls with experience of designing, implementing and operating controls on an ongoing basis and building and maintain robust control frameworks.
- Understanding of the I-E tax regime for Life Assurance Business (BLAGAB) and the taxation of unit-linked funds.
What we offer you
- Basic salary up to £80,000 per annum, dependant on experience
- Discretionary annual bonus dependent on your performance and company performance (circa 14%)
- Annual holiday allowance of 28 days holiday plus bank holidays
- Life Assurance (x4 pensionable earnings)
- Generous contributory Pension scheme (match up to 5% and pay in an additional 5%)
- 1 days paid charitable workday
- Employee Assistance Programme
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