Partner Matters Accountant

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Job Title

Partner Matters Accountant

Department

Finance

Office Location

London

Reports To

Partner Matters Manager

Working Hours

35 hours per week, 9:30am to 5:30pm but additional hours may be required.  We are happy to consider agile and flexible working patterns.  Our approach to hybrid working allows for up to 40% of time working from home and 60% working in the office, please contact a member of the recruitment team to discuss further.

Firm Description

Hogan Lovells is one of the leading global law firms.  Our distinctive market position is founded on our exceptional breadth of our practice, on deep industry knowledge, and on our 'one team' global approach.  Formed through the combination of two top international law firms, Hogan Lovells has over 40 offices in the Americas, Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. 

With a presence in the world's major financial and commercial markets, we are well placed to provide excellent business-oriented advice to our clients locally and internationally.  Our people are the key to our success, which is why we seek to recruit and retain the most talented individuals in all regions of our global practice.

Department Description

The Partner Matters team sits within the Tax and Partner Matters department and deals with all matters relating to partners' financial involvement in the firm and provides support to the firm's senior management on partner-related issues.  The London team is responsible for the partners of Hogan Lovells International LLP and its associated undertakings worldwide and works closely with the team in Washington that is primarily responsible for partners based in the Americas.

Role Overview

The role deals mainly with the partners of Hogan Lovells International LLP, of which there are approximately 400. The role primarily encompasses responsibility for payments to partners, accounting for various partner related transactions as well as responsibility in other non-accounting areas relating to the partners' personal financial interests in the firm.

Key Responsibilities / Accountabilities

• Ownership of the monthly drawings, quarterly distribution and bi-annual bonus payment processes, including calculation of amounts due to partners, accurate collection of disbursements from partners, ensuring accurate and timely sending of statements to individual partners.

• Ownership of the bank reconciliation process for all partner related bank accounts.

• Maintain complete and accurate data in respect of partner remuneration, including lateral hires, retirees, part-time work arrangements and guarantees.

• Attend meetings with joining and retiring partners, as well as ad hoc meetings with current partners, to explain the partner compensation process and answer partners’ questions.

• Transaction entry, reconciliation and review of all accounts in the firm's finance system relating to Partner Matters.

  • Assisting the Taxation Team with recording tax transactions (including tax payments, tax provisions, external advisers' fees, etc) in Elite 3E as required. 

  • Working with the Financial Accountants and overseas offices to ensure completeness and accuracy of all the above, ensuring that errors/omissions are identified, corrected and that reoccurrence is minimised.  

  • Attending to queries from the partners and third parties as required in relation to all the above.

  • Ongoing review, simplification and documentation of the department's procedures in relation to all the above.

• Maintain complete and accurate data in respect of capital, including maintaining the register of capital subscribed by Partners and associated capital loan details, assisting as required in the process for collecting capital subscriptions, collection of capital from new Partners and repayment of capital/capital loan balances to retired Partners.

• Provide confirmation of individual Partners' earnings to third parties as required.

• Provide estimates of individual equity partner profit share and cashflow calculations on an ad-hoc basis.

• Accurate and timely maintenance of the Partner profile data.

• Provision and maintenance of partner life and disability insurance schedules to the insurance provider.

• Suggest improvements to key processes undertaken by the team.

Specific duties or responsibilities may be reviewed from time to time to reflect changes in personnel and management structure, staff location or services.

All members of the firm participate in our Responsible Business program.

Person Specification

Qualifications, Experience and Training

• The candidate should be educated to A-level/Degree level and whilst an accounting qualification is not a pre-requisite they must possess  relevant accounting/book keeping experience ideally in a professional services organisation.

• A good working knowledge of Microsoft Office is required. Must be confident using Excel with linked spreadsheet and formulas such as Sumif and Vlookup.

• Proficient with Microsoft Word

• Working knowledge of Elite 3E is desirable but not essential.

• Experience using a document management system is desirable but not essential. 

General Attributes

• A proven ability to plan ahead is essential - the candidate will need to be able to work under pressure and to tight deadlines - for example, drawings, distributions and profit allocations need to be made on time.

• The individual must be thorough and demonstrate strong attention to detail. They will be expected to check their own work carefully and to have others review it critically.  The output of the Partner Matters team generally has a very high profile and errors will be noticed.

• Strong verbal and written communication skills and will be expected to communicate with colleagues, Partners and third parties.

• The Partner Matters team deals with a great deal of sensitive personal data relating to Partners.  The candidate must be capable of dealing with tact and discretion in his/her dealings with Partners and capable of ensuring that the confidentiality of the information is maintained.

• Accounting knowledge/skills (and an appetite to develop them).

• Ability to effectively manage own workload and proactive in assisting the team

• Builds and maintains effective working relationships with colleagues and clients

Agile Working Statement

Our goal is to embed flexibility across our business by giving everyone the opportunity to work in an agile way, whether as a regular pattern or on an ad hoc basis, and we will be happy to discuss this further.

Equal Opportunities Employment Statement

It is the policy of Hogan Lovells to provide equal opportunities for all employees in relation to recruitment, training and promotion.  Decisions in these areas will be made only by reference to the requirements of the job and shall not be influenced by any consideration of racial or ethnic origin, religion, sex , gender and gender identity, age, sexual orientation, marital and civil partnership status, pregnancy or disability.