Payroll Assistant

HR, Norwich, Fixed term (6 months)

The role

Working closely and reporting into the Payroll Manager and the firm’s HR operations team this is a fantastic opportunity to join a busy and well-respected HR team. The role will provide support in managing all aspects of the firm’s payroll function through the firm’s HR and payroll software, People-XD. This involves the delivery of the end-to-end payroll process of £40m annually with circa 1000 monthly paid employees, all associated administration and liaison with the Finance team

The activities

Processing of payroll

• Inputting, processing and administering all aspects of payroll and benefits including overtime, tax code changes, starters, leavers, all type of absences, season ticket loans, student loans, benefit and salary approvals/changes, with transparent processes and effective audit trails.
• Assisting with the checking of monthly payroll for sign off which will include producing reports, BACS salary submissions and all third-party payments ensuring all transactions are auditable.
• Undertaking thorough checking of payroll to ensure the integrity of our data and communicating with relevant internal and external clients where issues arise.
• Liaising with third parties such as HMRC, Benefex and P11D Organiser & uploading/exporting accurate data to or from their software.
• Assisting in finalising the tax year end in accordance with all timetables and deadlines.
• Interpreting and applying all internal policies and Government Legislation to ensure payroll transactions are made in accordance with them.
• Maintaining payroll processing documentation, spreadsheets and guidance notes.
• Supporting in the accurate recording and submission of all statutory information (such as RTI).
• Dealing with any payroll queries and offering guidance and assistance to employees and managers and dealing with manual pay adjustments as and when required.
• Working collaboratively with the wider HR team to improve knowledge and awareness of payroll related process.
• Supporting the effective implementation of annual payroll system upgrades and testing new functionality to support enhanced internal processes.

Benefits

• Processing employees who have been auto enrolled.
• Reviewing, processing and reconciling monthly flexible benefits through payroll.
• Submitting third party reports to benefit providers promptly following the BACs submission.

The person

This role would be a great opportunity to start your career in payroll working for a leading law firm. Alternatively, if you are experienced and enjoy a busy working environment this could also be for you.

This is a busy and challenging role, and your background will include previous payroll experience and/or knowledge or experience of working within a financial role together with a proven history of building strong stakeholder relationships. To be successful a high level of attention to detail is imperative as is your ability to deal quickly and accurately with a high volume of work with conflicting deadlines. You will have excellent analytical skills along with strong excel knowledge including formulae, pivot tables and VLOOKUP.

Given the challenges of this role, it is likely that your back and experience will include:-

• Ability to work with the utmost confidentiality and discretion.
• An approachable, proactive and professional working style, with a calm and methodical approach to your work and excellent attention to detail. You will have a common-sense approach to problem solving and be able to explain more complicated matters to staff and partners in a simple and straight forward way either verbally or in writing.
• In addition, you will be a self-starter. You will take accountability for your own tasks ensuring they are completed accurately and on time. You will possess strong communications skills and have an appetite for learning.

The role additionally requires someone who is:-

• is self-managed and confident in setting and prioritising their own work agenda.
• has excellent written as well as verbal communication skills and so is able to demonstrate that they can convey complex matters in a way that different audiences can understand.

The package

As you would expect, the firm offers a generous salary and benefits. The firm’s standard benefits are detailed in the following link:

The Mills & Reeve Business Services career structure

We have a firm wide Business Services career structure and a published career progression framework. Within the firm wide career structure there are five career levels. For the purposes of the framework, this role is at an Assistant level and the role profile that details the outcomes and activities expected of across the firm is included with this job description. Further information on the firm’s Business Services career structure is available from the HR team.

Pre-employment screening

Please note that, in the event that we make an offer of employment, we will conduct pre-employment screening that includes, but is not limited to, a basic DBS check, right to work check, any disciplinary history recorded with the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) and a self-declaration to assess your character and suitability for the role. A full policy of the screening the firm undertakes is available on request.

The firm

Mills & Reeve is a major UK law firm renowned for its outstanding service to national and international clients, for its collaborative culture and for its deep sector expertise.

The firm has a strong sector focus with expertise in agriculture, charities, education, food and beverage, health, insurance, private wealth, real estate investment, sport and technology. Clients include businesses from PLCs to start-ups, high net worth individuals and landowners, more than 120 universities, colleges and education bodies and over 100 healthcare organisations.

This is an ideal opportunity to build your skills and experience with a major UK law firm, listed as one of the “Sunday Times 100 Best Companies to Work For” for the last 20 years - the only law firm to achieve this.

We are also proud to have been awarded Platinum Investors in People status this year. The firm joins a select club of only 6% of 50,000 assessed organisations awarded the coveted platinum status.

The firm is also delighted to report for the eighth year running we were named as one of Roll On Friday’s ‘best law firms to works at’.

And finally

Mills & Reeve is committed to providing an inclusive and supportive working environment. We are happy to consider flexible working arrangements and endeavour to achieve the right balance for both our people and the business. This attitude to flexible working ensures we continue to provide outstanding service to our clients, whilst allowing our people to develop their careers in the knowledge that personal priorities will remain just that.

Mills & Reeve is committed to promoting equality, diversity and to providing an inclusive and supportive environment. Please click the link below to find further information regarding our diversity policy.

If you would like any more information about Mills & Reeve, you can visit our website by clicking on the following link: