Terms of Reference

Position Title:

Program Accountant

Location:

Hanoi, with travel to Project areas

Reporting To:

Operations Manager

Back ground

With more than 35 years of experience, Cowater International is Canada’s global leader in management consulting services specialising in international development. We have managed the implementation of over 2500 projects in more than 95 countries around the globe for clients such as FCDO UK, DFAT Australia, the European Union, the World Bank and Global Affairs Canada. We work with governments, partner organisations, communities and civil society to design and implement sustainable solutions that generate lasting social, economic and environmental impacts.

Cowater is recruiting a highly qualified professional as Program Accountant to support a socio-economic development initiative - Aus4Equality|Gender-Responsive Equitable Agriculture and Tourism (GREAT Program) in Vietnam. 

The objectives of the Aus4Equality|GREAT Program are:

Objective 1 – Women, particularly ethnic minority women living in Son La and Lao Cai, have improved economic benefits.

Objective 2 – Women, particularly ethnic minority women living in Son La and Lao Cai, have increased confidence and social status, including more balanced workloads and greater decision-making within the home, workplace, and community.      

Objective 3 – Women, particularly ethnic minority women and household members living in Son La and Lao Cai benefit from more gender-responsive, inclusive, and effective provincial and national policies, plans, strategies, and programs.

The program is now entering its second five-year phase and GREAT 2 will continue its focus on agriculture and tourism, identifying specific sectors that lend themselves to opportunities for women’s economic empowerment and work with multiple stakeholders to address constraints, generate opportunities, drive market growth and increase productive value of the sector.

Statement of Duty:

Reporting to the Operations Manager, the Program Accountantis responsible to providing high level accounting,financial services to the Aus4Equality Project. This includes supporting the Operations Manager to process and monitor payments and expenditures, banking, electronic payments and funds transfer, funds requests, taxation, internal audit support, petty cash, payroll, facilitate and month-end processes. Providing these services in an effective and efficient manner will ensure that project finances are accurate and up to date, that staff are paid in a timely and appropriate manner and that vendors and suppliers are paid within established time limits in accordance with the procedures and guidelines laid out in the Aus4Equality Standard Operation Procedures and Cowater’s accounting and financial systems.

The Program Accountant also supervise the service of the Admin/Finance Officer on petty cash management.

Specific Duties:

Planning and Budgeting:

• Support the development, monitoring and updating of annual budgets, commitments and expenditures;
• Support the Operations Manager in ensuring that the annualBudgets and expenditures including the program’s partnership fundings are aligned with the approved Annual Work Plans;

Accounting and Book-keeping:

• Establish and properly maintain the finance and account systems of the program in accordance with GREAT’s SOP and Cowater’saccounting and financial rules and procedures;
• Review invoices to all transactions and check that all supporting documentations are properly filed;
• Ensure the expenditure of the program’s funds are made in accordance with the approved AWP and are recorded to the correct budget lines;
• Check, inspect, organize and maintain the financial records of the program - maintain files for all transactions, ensuring that copies of all vouchers for the financial transactions are orderly filed and have all the required supporting documents attached, in order to support internal and external reviews and audits;
• Ensure tracking of milestone payments to service providers;
• Ensure daily maintenance of the financial journal and daily entry of financial transactions into the accounting system;
• Assist with the preparation and coordination of internal and external finance and procedural audits, and respond to all auditors correspondences.

Reporting

• Process year-end and month-end reconciliations;
• Monitor the spending of the budget and actual monthly cash flows and ensure adequate follow ups;
• Prepare monthly financial reports in the standard format(s) required by GREAT and Cowater and submit the reports to the OPS manager before the deadlines;
• Support the process of preparing and submitting periodical financial reports to the Donor, working closely with the Cowater Contractor Representative, the Operations Manager, and the Program Deputy Team Leader and the Program Team Leader; and
• Provide quality checking of financial reports.

Internal control, audit and compliance

• Assist in the monitoring of the financial management and accounting system, including fraud control and audit procedures as well as the financial management of provincial offices;
• Provision of briefings, information and training for all relevant stakeholders in the application of Cowater’s and the donor’s financial management procedures and accounting, reporting and audit requirements
• Support the Operations Manager in putting in place an Standard Operating Procedures; 
• Support the Cowater Contractor Representative and the Operations Manager in performing procedures project bank accounts.

Others:

• Respond to all queries relating to payments;
• Manage program bank account and maintain the relationship with bank;
• Be responsible for Personal Income Tax reports to Tax Department as required by law and for VAT refund procedures;
• Work with local Department of Social Insurance, Health Insurance and Unemployment Insurance for project staffs
• Prepare annual PERFORMS to submit to DFAT; draft annual report to Hanoi DOIT; and
• Provide other support to Operations team as needed

Requirements

• University Degree Accounting or Finance
• At least 5 years of experience in Financial and Accounting; preferably on large-scale donor-funded programs and/or other large, complex international development initiatives
• Able to operate Quickbooks accounting software;
• Experienced in forecasting and developing budget
• Experienced in working with local authorities on PIT, VAT, Insurance and annual reporting
• Able to communicate fluently and effectively in Vietnamese and English;
• Excellent interpersonal skills and ability to build strong, collaborative relationships with colleagues and a broad range of stakeholders across multiple sectors; and
• Strong organisational skills and ability to respond quickly to various requests in a dynamic environment with firm deadlines and competing priorities