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Student Accounts Manager

Location: Hybrid – Work from home 2 days and Bournemouth based office 3 days

Are you an experienced professional in customer-facing credit control or customer account management and looking to work in an energetic and exciting company? We have the ideal job for you!

About Kaplan International Pathways

Kaplan International Pathways, a division of Kaplan Inc., offers international students a wide range of flexible study options - from university preparation programmes in the UK, Australia, USA and Japan through to full degree programmes in Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia. Through our academic partnerships with leading universities, our expertise in student recruitment, our exceptional teaching and a focus on customer service and pastoral care, each year we are proud to welcome thousands of students from more than 100 countries onto our programmes. As a commercially successful business which has experienced strong growth in recent years, there are excellent opportunities for long-term career progression.

About the role

You will be given responsibility for managing the Student Accounts Team who are responsible for all aspects of student account management: credit control; refund processing; and updating records to ensure their accuracy. This responsibility includes significant direct student contact; co-ordinating account write-off reviews with internal teams (colleges and sales); payment plan management and other finance processes relating to these activities.

You will ensure that the team are chasing outstanding student balances in line with our agreed methodology to minimise the risk of bad debt. You will keep key business partners up to date with debt status and any trends you identify. For this reason, you will be experienced with system reporting and preparing presentations on your reports for management. You will escalate issues and concerns where necessary. You will be the main relationship manager with other business units such as sales and marketing, admissions and the college teams that feed into / need information on student finance and student accounts. Your team will all be based in Bournemouth and will have the same location and working conditions.

Your main responsibilities and functions are to:

• 
  Coordinate, organise and oversee the work of three Student Account Officers and one intern
• Coordinate work within the finance team relating to other student account activities
• Ensure all appropriate procedures are being followed and that all deadlines and performance measures are achieved
• Provide performance related information to your line manager in accordance with observed and monitored work.
• Train both Finance and non-Finance staff on student finance and related systems.
• Own the relationship with the Admissions team and other pre-arrival internal teams.
• Own the relationship with college staff and College Directors for escalations and debt reporting.
• Co-own the relationship with Flywire (our online payment solution provider).
• Foster and maintain good business relationships with all other stakeholders (internal and external)
• Approve payment plans outside of terms and conditions.
• Provide quarterly debt analysis to support debt provisions
• Provide issue resolution and, in particular, payment solutions.
• Hold finance meetings with Students during peak enrolment times
• Coordinate termly debt and credit write offs
• Identify and recommend process improvements related to own work and to credit control
• Manage the central accounts inbox, delegating work to relevant team members
• Project support on a new student account management tool that is being built
• Other ad-hoc tasks

About you

To be considered for the role, you need direct experience in credit control management or student/customer account management. You must have experience training and developing staff.

You will also need:

• 
  The ability and desire to work in a fast-paced, high-volume finance environment.
• Some knowledge of and experience of working with accounting principles
• Strong client focus with excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Good attention to detail
• Ability to work under pressure and meet strict deadlines
• Natural curiosity and a strong desire to learn and develop both yourself and a team
• To be a team player and have a strong work ethic
• To be extremely accurate and detail-focussed
• To have the initiative to take ownership and identify improvements and drive to deliver change
• Good Excel knowledge (V Lookups, pivot tables, formatting of data)
• Credit control qualification is desirable but not mandatory

What we can offer

You will be a key member of our finance team, managing a team of three student account officers who are responsible for collecting debt from students studying at colleges across the UK. You will build strong relationships with colleagues across the business, from admissions to colleges. The role does not require regular travel.

You will be based in our Bournemouth College but will form part of the Operational Finance team which sits within our head office finance department. The role will report directly into our Head of Operational Finance and have management reporting responsibilities up to our Financial Controller and Finance Director.

We also offer:

• 
  A supportive environment in which to grow and develop
• A team of finance specialists to work with and learn from
• Dynamic, international environment
• Career development and training
• Benefits including pension, medical cashback plan, ride2work scheme, and discounts at leading retailers and wellbeing providers, financial wellbeing programme

To Apply:

Please submit a CV and covering letter explaining why you believe you are suitable for the role.

Closing date: TBC – please note applications are being reviewed on a rolling basis and we may close the role before the closing date if a suitable shortlist has been gathered

At Kaplan International, we are committed to working in a diverse organisation and strive to provide equality of opportunity for all. We encourage and welcome applications from individuals, regardless of age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender reassignment or identity, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief and marriage and civil partnership. If as a disabled applicant (as defined under the Equality Act 2010) you would like to request that your application is considered under our Guaranteed Interview Scheme (GIS) please let us know using this form

As part of our commitment to safeguarding, successful candidates will be subject to an enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service check.

Applicants must be able to provide proof of eligibility to work in the UK.