Pension Officer

About the role
The Pensions Service is looking for a highly motivated individual to join our Administration team as a Pensions Officer for a one year fixed term maternity post. You will be performance focused and driven to provide excellent customer service. You must demonstrate a flexible approach to delivering all aspects of pension administration.

We are a very friendly team and there is plenty of opportunity for development within the Pensions Service.

What will you be doing?
The Pensions Officer role sits within the Operations Team & is responsible for pension administration tasks including processing benefit calculations, data input and validation, responding to queries from members, employers, pensioners and dependents, peer check colleagues’ casework, updating/processing member records with the relevant information. This fast-paced customer facing role is critical to ensure casework is either dealt with immediately at the point of contact or is efficiently allocated to the appropriate casework team.

Please see job description for further information about what this role involves.

About you
You’ll need previous experience of working within the LGPS and ideally experience in a similar role. Your excellent communication skills and confidence with analysing pension issues and offering sound, reliable and professional information will enable you to explain clearly complex pension issues to non-specialists.

You will be able to pay high attention to detail to ensure all tasks are processed efficiently and accurately in line with the LGPS regulations using a variety of MS Office and IT resources.

Previous experience using Altair and/or ERP is advantageous.

We will provide full and comprehensive training to give you the skills and confidence you need to complete the role.

Please see person specification for a full list of essential and desirable criteria.

About us
We’re a new council, following one of the largest shake-ups in local government reform in recent history. As a new authority, we’re embarking on an exciting journey to deliver exceptional services for our residents, customers and communities.

Our vision at West Northamptonshire Council is ‘to make West Northants a great place to live, work, visit and thrive’. We truly stand by this and work hard every day to make this a reality. Our corporate values, THRIVE, stand for: Trust, High Performance, Respect, Innovate and Empower, they underpin everything we do and how we deliver services.

At West Northants Council, it’s about our people. People who thrive with ambition, bubble with new ideas, demand better ways of working, caring about every detail, and who never shy away from a challenge. Our culture is a gateway for new experiences. A place to forge new opportunities. To empower you in your career and unite you with like-minded people.

When potential is unlocked, talent thrives.

Choose a career that offers you a true sense of achievement, fills you with pride and challenges you in a positive way, every day.

**West Northants Council, where careers thrive.**

Our benefits
We offer a wide range of benefits to our employees, these include:

- **Generous annual leave entitlement** starting at 27 days annual leave per year, 28 days for senior managers (pro rata, depending on how many hours per week you work), plus bank holidays. An additional 5 days, linked to continuous service, and ability to purchase up to 6 weeks additional leave per year.
- **Local Government Pension Scheme plus immediate life cover** (3 times your annual salary from day one) and ill-health protection.
- **Employee discounts** with local and national retailers, days out, finance, health and beauty, travel and eating out plus lots more.
- **Car Lease scheme**:

- **Employee Assistance Programme** - We have an employee support programme run by Health Assured, an independent, external organisation. Health Assured is available for you and your immediate family members, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year and includes telephone counselling, legal advice, bereavement support and medical information.
- **Ongoing training and development** opportunities.
- **Our West Ways of Working **- We want our workforce to thrive, and we equip our employees with the right technology to support hybrid and collaborative working, on or off site, depending on the role.
- **Making a difference** - If you want to use your skills and experience with an organisation that are genuinely invested in making a difference, are committed to improving people's lives, and whose success has a direct impact on the wellbeing of your family, friends and people in your local area, then West Northamptonshire Council is the place for you.

The council is in the process of implementing a new pay structure and terms and conditions which will be applicable to this role. The outcome could result in a future variation to the advertised salary, and this will be discussed at interview.