The International Growth Centre aims to promote sustainable growth in developing countries by providing demand-led policy advice based on frontier research. The IGC directs a global network of world-leading researchers and in-country teams in Africa and South Asia. The IGC works closely with partner governments to generate high quality research and policy advice on key growth challenges, focusing on four themes: state effectiveness, firms, cities and energy.
IGC’s current partner countries include Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Ghana, Mozambique, Pakistan, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Uganda and Zambia. Based at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and in partnership with the University of Oxford, the IGC is funded primarily by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO), with support from various other donors including the Rockefeller Foundation and Aceli Africa.
This Finance Administrator role is responsible to ensure the following:
1. Processing fee claims and milestone instalments in SPEAR via a bulk upload process. This will
also involve generating financial records in SPEAR for services agreement invoices to be
included in the invoice bulk upload.
2. Quality checking expense claims submitted by external claimants, ensuring the costs adhere to
LSE and donor financial regulations and are accompanied by valid receipts. Once checked, the
expenses will also be processed for payment using the expense claim bulk upload.
3. Payment and reconciliation of advance accounts to country offices and staff. This will involve use
of the SPEAR advances process and will incorporate conversations with country teams and our
administrative partners to clear outstanding balances.
4. Processing country payroll and associated tax payments, liaising with external consultants and
accounting for financial regulations within individual registered countries.
5. Dealing with payment queries submitted to the IGC fees inbox, liaising with central LSE Finance
to ensure payment delays are minimised and issues are resolved in a timely fashion.
Responsibilities
Use the School’s financial software and SPEAR (IGC’s internal programme management system)
to process fee claims and milestone payments
• Process and monitor expense claims for all external IGC contributors, ensuring these are in line
with policy prior to payment authorisation
• Follow up with fee or expense claimants where inaccurate or incomplete paperwork has been
submitted
• Reconcile staff and institutional advances with payments and ensure that refunds are made in
timely fashion
• Process monthly in-country payroll and tax payments, liaising with external consultants to ensure
payments are made in a timely fashion
• Review final financial statements to ensure institutionally contracted project funds are correctly
accounted for
• Respond to specific payment queries raised by both external stakeholders and IGC colleagues
and to take necessary action to address them, knowing when to refer to senior colleagues
• Ensure that invoice and expense claims are coded accurately against correct budget lines
• Ensure contract fee rates are not exceeded and that agreed contract rates are applied when
making payments to contractors
• Take responsibility for routine financial and procedural administration for the IGC, ensuring
existing accounting timetables are adhered to
• Employ strong IT and clerical skills in the use of MS Office suite, and in particular in the use of
Excel, to an advanced level
• Support the Head of IGC Financial Management in monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of
IGC’s financial and procedural activities and the use of information systems (manual and
electronic), being proactive in seeking and making improvements to these where appropriate
• Solve financial problems as they arise, e.g. inaccuracies in accounts or contracts, working with
colleagues to proactively ensure measures are put in place to prevent recurrences of such
problems
• Become knowledgeable of and adhere to all relevant IGC and LSE financial and procedural
requirements
• Carry out all duties with diligence, accuracy and appropriate levels of confidentiality
• Ensure that financial files are kept up to date and sensitive records are correctly maintained in an
electronic document management system
Understand the common goals of the IGC Finance team and to bear joint responsibility for
ensuring all financial and procedural activities run smoothly
• Develop knowledge of LSE processes and build and maintain working relationships and share
best practice internally with administrative colleagues across the School
• Participate in networks internally (particularly with IGC colleagues, the Finance Division and
across the School)
• Participate in networks externally – enabling and maintaining good relations to ensure that a
positive impression of the IGC and the School is maintained