Team Leader - Offshore Fund Reporting (SA) at Apex Group

Summary of the position

The role of the Team Leader – Offshore Fund Reporting (SA) which will form part of the Offshore Fund Reporting (SA) team based in South Africa at our Mowbray Office, will be to oversee and manage a team reponsible for the preparion of regulatory and other third party reporting for offshore funds in line with relevant jurisdictional and third party reporting requirements.

Main responsibilities of the role will include managing a team responsible for the preparation of monthly reporting packs for offshore portfolios that gets produced from daily valuations as prepared by the Offshore Fund Accounting (SA) team.

The roles will also include responsibility to perform reviews of reporting packs to third party information and providing necessary technical guidance and training to the team to ensure updates to reporting packs are perfomed in time that will ensure complete and accurate information and delivery of reporting packs to external parties take place in accordance with service level agreement deadlines.

Team Leader – Offshore Fund Reporting (SA) is also required to ensure team follows checklists and standard operational processes to meet required quality standards and to assist Managers with oversight reporting reviews as and when needed.

In addition the role’s responsiblities will also include involvement in key projects that relates to but are not limited to system upgrades, process optimisations and improvement initiatives to drive continious efficiences and the effective delivery of packs to internal/external clients.

Outline of main duties and responsibilities

The Team Leader – Offshore Fund Reporting (SA) will be expected to:

• Manage production schedule and allocation of resources to ensure fund reporting packs are prepared and submitted to external parties ito service level agreement requirements;
• Perform reviews of monthly reporting packs as produced by Fund Reporting Accountants using Trial Balance reports and other supporting accounting extracts to ensure external reporting requirements and deadlines of the Fund are met;
• Oversee submission of monthly reporting by Fund Reporting Accountants and other ad-hoc reporting requirements to external parties and/or other offices in the Group to ensure deadlines are met;
• Assist Fund Reporting Accountants on queries relating to the collation and verification of information obtained from third parties to ensure reporting packs detail are complete and accurate;
• Oversee escalations of reconciling items as queried by Fund Reporting Accountants with Offshore Fund Accounting (SA) team to ensure reconciliation items are valid and where updates to NAV are required that adjustments are correctly accounted for;
• Communicate and respond to queries originating from third party recipients of the reporting packs and ensuring updates to reporting packs are addressed by the team;
• Ensure expense payment templates and related invoices for dissemination to third parties are completed in time to enable payment by custodian to be actioned timeously;
• Ensure internal reviews and checks are performed by team prior to submission of reporting packs for oversight review by other offices;
• Ensure team maintains process documents, follows operational processes and reporting checklists and implement controls where required to reduce risk of reporting errors in reporting packs;
• Oversee Cherwell’s logged to the Offshore Fund Reporting (SA) team to ensure open items are resolved by team timeously to meet SLA turnaround times;
• Play a key role in improving current reporting process and building efficiencies with further automation of the process where possible/applicable;
• Ensure queries from oversight team are investigated and resolved timeously as requested; and
• Play an important part in projects that relates to but are not limited to system upgrades, process optimisations and improvement initiatives to drive continious efficiences and effective delivery of packs ito teams SLA requirements.

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 4 years’ experience in asset management portfolio administration and pricing and accounting for investment funds;
• At least 1 year experience in a supervisory/team leader/manager capacity will be needed;
• Proven experience in compiling financial reports, using accounting related system reports and managing deliverables with tight deadlines will be an advantage;
• Knowledge and understanding of jurisdictional reporting requirements will be beneficial;
• Knowledge and experience with the use of InvestOne, NX Manager & Xceptor is an advantage;
• Strong problem solving and trouble shooting skills to resolve complex reporting issues and reconciliation breaks between reports;
• A strong all-round understanding and proven track record of experience in fund accounting and related reporting;
• A self-starter and can-do attitude will be essential;
• Experience with offshore investment products (various fund types including Unit Trusts, Multi-Manager, Segregated Portfolios, ETF’s, Pooled products) and a detailed understanding of funds tax calculations and fee structures will be an advantage; and
• Computer literate with an excellent working knowledge of MS office & IT packages (particularly Excel).