Guy’s and St Thomas’ is among the UK’s busiest and most successful NHS foundation trusts. We provide a full range of hospital and community services for people in south London and as well as specialist care for patients from further afield including cancer, renal, orthopaedic, respiratory and cardiovascular services. Guy’s is home to the largest dental school in Europe and a £160 million Cancer Centre opened in 2016. As part of our commitment to provide care closer to home, in 2017 we also opened a cancer centre and a kidney treatment centre at Queen Mary’s Hospital in Sidcup. St Thomas’ has one of the largest critical care units in the UK and one of the busiest emergency departments in London. It is also home to Evelina London Children’s Hospital. Evelina London cares for local children in Lambeth and Southwark and provides specialist services across south east England including cardiac, renal and critical care services. We lead a number of specialist service networks aiming to ensure children are treated locally where possible, but have access to specialist expertise when they need it. Our community services include health visiting, school nursing and support for families of children with long-term conditions. Our adult community services teams deliver care at the heart of the local communities we serve, working in partnership with GPs, local authorities and other healthcare and voluntary sector organisations. Working with our partners in Lambeth and Southwark, we are focusing on new ways of working to improve care for local patients. In February 2021 the Royal Brompton and Harefield joined Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, bringing together world-leading expertise in the care and research of heart and lung disease. Our merger provides a once in a generation opportunity to build a lasting, world-renowned heart and lung centre, providing the highest quality care for patients and conducting world-leading research. We have a reputation for clinical excellence and high quality teaching and research. We are part of King’s Health Partners, one of eight accredited UK academic health sciences centres. In partnership with King’s College London we have dedicated clinical research facilities including an MHRA accredited Phase I clinical trials unit. Patients are at the heart of everything we do and we pride ourselves on ensuring the best possible patient experience as well as safe, high quality care. We are proud to have one of the lowest mortality rates in the NHS. Following a comprehensive Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection in 2019 we maintained our overall rating of ‘good’. Our adult community services achieved a rating of ‘outstanding’. The commitment of our 23,500 staff is key to our success. We are one of the largest local employers and we aim to develop and support all our staff so they are able to deliver high quality, safe and efficient care. The 2019 NHS staff survey results show that we have one of the most engaged and motivated workforces in the NHS. We know this has a positive impact on the care provided to our patients. We have one of the most ambitious capital investment programmes anywhere in the NHS. Job overview To provide a professional and effective credit control/cash collection service on assigned accounts and customers. Ensure all monies due are promptly and efficiently collected, in line with targets, and all customer complaints and queries are logged and resolved. Ensure that appropriate reports are run and produced and that accounts are reconciled as per the departmental procedures. To provide advice, information and guidance to all debtors and their representatives regarding debt issues, effectively overcoming barriers to repayment. To contribute to the maximisation of income by monitoring and ensuring the correct application of complex and varied price tariffs for a range of debtors. To identify where invoicing staff may not be applying them correctly and to aid the standard interpretation and application of tariffs across all sites Main duties of the job This is an exciting and challenging area of work requiring a range of credit control and negotiation skills to collect Trust debt from NHS, private and international patients, research partners and domestic non NHS customers. With Trust income of over £2 B annually the credit control team are working each day to ensure cash is collected from a wide variety of customers for a diverse range of services expected from a leading NHS Trust. Each credit controller has their own section of the sales ledger to manage and can expect to deal with a portfolio of debt issues each month to meet DSO targets. The successful candidate will demonstrate a range of debt management skills including a high collection record from previous roles, the ability to manage their workload with minimal supervision and meet monthly deadlines for debtor reporting. Strong communications, Excel skills and problem solving abilities are essential. Please note the role is offered on a fix term basis for 12 months and is office based. Working for our organisation Income Treasury and Cashiers are responsible for external customer billing for all goods and services provided by the Trust. The department is responsible also for debt collection and processing of all receipts to customer accounts. There is a Cash Office on both hospital sites that looks after patients' monies and patient travel refunds. Detailed job description and main responsibilities Perform the credit control/cash collection and query management & resolution for all assigned accounts including liaison with customers via letter, email, telephone and meetings with minimal supervision from the Income Manager. Meet the targets set by the Income Manager and keep the Income Manager informed of progress and problems that arise. Log all queries arising on assigned accounts under the query management system as set out by the Income Manager within 24 hours of the query arising. Ensure all calls, letters and action taken are logged on the diary system for each account. Produce a status report of all credit balances and work unallocated credits to ensure prompt clearance of these items from the Sales Ledger. Clearance may take the form of reallocation, refund or a proposal to write back into reserves. Liaise with the budget holders in order to receive support in settling the outstanding debt e.g. to resolve disputes around the provision of a purchase order or the calculation of a liability. Perform follow up action on all accounts passed to external debt collectors and maintain a spreadsheet detailing the status of all invoices to be passed to the Income Manager on a weekly basis. Attend meetings as required with internal departments to discuss levels of debt. Have regular follow up meetings with customers with high value or volume accounts in order to resolve the outstanding invoices. Some litigation work and court attendance may be required. To refer to the Income Manager, as per the policy, any accounts for write off or to be sent to debt collection agencies providing full correspondence (including invoices/credits), history of chase cycle and reason for referral. Produce a report on a monthly basis to Income Manager for all balances over ninety days. Produce a monthly report on all balances outstanding detailing what action has been taken, comments as to why the account has not been paid, instalments arrangements, invoices in query - along with date and detail, or invoices with debt collection agency - along with date referred. Take and process card payment details. Collate information and draft responses in respect of complaints. Work collaboratively with other departments to provide complete and appropriate information to assist in the resolution of payment / cash allocation issues. To provide cover for other Credit Controllers in their absence. Person specification Skills Essential criteria Good working knowledge of debt collection procedures and legislation Excellent oral and written communication skills Excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to work closely and effectively with staff at all levels Able to use judgement and experience to analyse the sales ledger Experience Essential criteria Considerable experience of working in a debtors and credit control team including direct involvement in all aspects of credit management including litigation Experience of using a computerised sales ledger system and able to contribute to developments and systems improvements Knowledge Essential criteria AAT Intermediate, ICM Certificate Level or NVQ level 4 in Accounting or equivalent experience ECDL qualification or equivalent experience Guy’s and St Thomas’ celebrates, respects and values the diversity of its staff and patients. We review our policies, procedures and practices to ensure that all employees, patients and carers are treated equitable according to their needs. We are actively committed to ensuring that no one who applies for a job, works or study’s at the Trust, or accesses our services is discriminated against on the grounds of race, ethnicity, nationality, disability, religion or belief, age, gender identity , gender reassignment, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity/paternity, or marital/civil partnership. Applications are welcomed from applicants with a disability. We can make reasonable adjustments and offer support and advice in a variety of ways throughout the application process. Equality of opportunity is our policy. As an organisation we are committed to developing our services in ways that best suit the needs of our patients. This means that some staff groups will increasingly be asked to work a more flexible shift pattern so that we can offer services in the evenings or at weekends. Flexible working We are committed to supporting all employees to achieve a healthy work life balance and to work in a way that is best for them and our patients. We will consider all requests to work flexibly, taking in to account the individual’s personal circumstances as well the needs of the service. We encourage all prospective applicants to discuss their individual circumstances with the recruiting manager as part of the on-boarding process. Your e-mail address is important to us - We communicate to all job applicants via the e-mail address which has been provided on the application form. Please ensure that you check your e-mail on a regular basis. Please apply for this post by clicking "Apply Online Now." Further details / informal visits contact Name Jennifer Brown Job title Income Manager Email address [email protected] Telephone number 0207 1882403 Additional information Kam Ng can be contacted in absence by email: [email protected]