Senior Fund Accountant – Offshore Fund Accounting (Cape Town) at Apex Group

Summary of the position

The role of the Senior Fund Accountant – Offshore Fund Accounting (S.A) will be to perform and provide assurance on offshore fund valuations as produced by the Offshore Fund Accounting (S.A) team based in South Africa at our Mowbray Office.

Main responsibilities of the role includes administration and accounting for offshore portfolios as part of the daily NAV calculation, validation and review processes. Role will require of the individual to administer the funds efficiently and accurately in line with daily service level agreement deadlines which includes intraday and end-of-day fund valuations.

The role will require of the individual to perform fund valuation reviews and validations of NAV inputs from other service teams and to third party provided information to ensure overall accuracy of the valuation prior to final oversight reivew

The role will also involve ensuring standard operating procedures are followed, NAV quality standards are met and that the necessary training and techincal guidance are provided to the Fund Accountants to support the effective and timely delivery of the fund valuations as part of the daily operations of the team.

Outline of main duties and responsibilities

The Senior Fund Accountant will be expected to:

• Ensure accurate calculations of fund valuations and accounting to Trial Balance;
• Collate and verify information obtained from internal operational teams and third parties;
• Communicate and respond to queries originating from internal oversight teams and/or external queries from clients and assist the team and the Managers in resolving offshore fund accounting queries;
• Communicate and respond to fund-related queries originating from different Fund Services SA operational teams and follow up with queries to ensure issues are addressed for purposes of completing the valuation;
• Ensure material NAV errors are identified and escalated to Managers, and appropriately remediated via NAV re-price process and that sufficient corrective actions are implemented to mitigate risk of error repeating;
• Perform internal review checks within the teamof all valuations in line with service level agreements delivery deadlines and ensure that valuations are sent to the CSL oversight team prior to deadline;;
• Document and continuously update operational processes, ensure fund valuation checklists are followed and implement controls to reduce valuation error risks;
• Manage Cherwell’s logged to the Offshore Fund Accounting (S.A) team, and resolve open items within SLA timelines;
• Play a key role as part of project implementation of new funds to facilitate a smooth operational handover and monitor daily operational controls and checks to mitigate risk;
• Provide support to internal teams / auditors by responding to financial statement audit / ISAE 3402 audits on queries relating to fund valuations to ensure external auditors queries are resolved and audit timelines are met.
• Provide necessary training and guidance to Fund Accountants to ensure standard operating procedures are followed and quality standards adhered to.

Skills and experience required

The successful candidate will have:

• A BCom or similar, accounting, economics or investments background is preferred;
• The relevant experience includes at least 24 months experience in asset management portfolio administration and pricing of offshore funds;
• Proven competence and an aptitude for working with systems and its integration;
• Knowledge and experience with the use of InvestOne, NX Manager & Xceptor is an advantage;
• Computer literate with an excellent working knowledge of MS office & IT packages (particularly Excel);
• A strong all-round understanding and proven track record of experience in fund accounting, the trade life cycle as part of back office administration;
• Experience with offshore investment products (various fund types including Unit Trusts, Multi-Manager, Segregated Portfolios, ETF’s, Pooled products) will be an advantage; and Detailed understanding of funds and fee structures