Arwa Ali, finance officer

Arwa Ali

finance officer

Tract Consultants pty ltd

Location
Australia
Education
Master's degree, Masters of Business Management
Experience
7 years, 10 Months

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Work Experience

Total years of experience :7 years, 10 Months

finance officer at Tract Consultants pty ltd
  • Australia - Melbourne
  • My current job since September 2023
Senior Finance at Tract Consultants Pty Ltd
  • Australia - Melbourne
  • My current job since September 2023

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Managing all aspects of financial operations, including budgeting, forecasting, and financial reporting.
• Led annual audit processes and liaised with external auditors to ensure compliance with regulatory requirements.
• Maintaining fixed Asset Register and performing bank reconciliations
• Processing daily and monthly journal entries including preparing payroll journals, salaries and FTE analysis and end of month payroll reconciliations.
• Processing payroll on a bi-monthly basis for over 350+ employees
• Managing all aspects of payroll including, payroll tax, Workcover, and superannuation calculations.
• Analysis and review of financial statements to ensure compliance with Accounting Standards.
• Preparing financial management reports on a monthly basis including planning and forecasting.
• Preparing monthly management accounts for the executives review including cashflows, income budgets, and expenses breakdown.
• Preparing and on charging monthly recoverable expenditure for the FY onto the tenant account.
• Preparing quarterly Business Activity Statement (BAS) and annual Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT).
• Conduct internal audits for finance processes and controls as required.
• Attending the day to day queries from the internal and external stakeholders.
• Working with the CFO and COO on the development, implementation and review of the organisations financial and performance reports, policies, systems, and procedures.
• Performing credit card administration, routine journals entries and monthly reporting. Following up on un-coded credit card transactions.
• Conducting variance analysis and provided actionable insights to senior management, resulting in improved decision-making and cost control.

MAJOR ACHIEVEMENTS:
• Developed a customized financial model to track project expenses and revenues, enabling better decision-making and increasing overall project profitability by 15%.
• Identified ineficiencies in procurement processes and negotiated vendor contracts, resulting in a 10% reduction in material costs.
• Implemented standardized financial reporting templates and dashboards for project managers, improving transparency and enabling timely decision-making.

Finance Oficer at Juilliard Group
  • Australia - Melbourne
  • January 2022 to September 2023

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Preparing monthly management accounts for the executives review including cashflows, income budgets, and expenses breakdown.
• Preparing and on charging monthly recoverable expenditure for the FY onto the tenant account.
• Managing end to end debtor management function and ensuring tenant accounts are regularly reconciled as per lease contract and industry regulations. Reconciliation of the debtors subledger to general ledger on a FN basis.
• Providing regular support to senior accountant and finance manager to prepare month end accounts.
• Monthly credit card reconciliations of business cards - coding transactions to relevant GL and following up on unidentified/uncoded transactions and performing routine journal reconciliation.
• Working closely with asset managers to ensure accurate financial reporting for each property/assets.
• Working independently to manage the cash flow of multiple capital and fit out projects simultaneously.
• Preparing monthly statement of financial position for MD review consisting of personal investments, projects, and family loans.
• Assisting Finance Manager in preparing income budget for the asset managers that includes projected income and expenses for the upcoming year, based on historical data and current market trends.
• Performing regular General Ledger Reconciliation / General Accounting.
• Performing weekly bank reconciliations for multiple business entities and daily bank account administration - providing daily bank transaction report to MD.
• Facilitating drawing down on tenants bank guarantee by organizing meetings with bank managers and collection of cheques.
• Preparation of provision for doubtful debts including detailed analysis and commentary on each debtor.
• Assisting with the preparation and reconciliation of building outgoings, issuing statement to the tenants, and making related adjustments to their tenancy ledgers.
• Assisting with other areas of management reporting as required such as month end accruals and prepayments.

Credit Analyst at 1st Energy Pty Ltd
  • Australia - East Melbourne
  • May 2019 to January 2022

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Oversee portfolio of 450+ residential and business accounts on a daily basis from billing through to payment
• Managing accounts for payment dispute, discrepancies, credit enquiries and disconnections
• Handled customer service calls and inquiries from customers across Tasmania, NSW, QLD and SA
• Conducting disconnections on a daily basis for over 50 residential and commercial customers
• Issuing field visit requests through third party and regularly liaising with Field agency to contact established and payment obtained.
• Prioritized and organized work assignment of approximately 200 closed accounts to meet deadlines before issuing out to DCAs.
• Initiated hardship assistance program to assist customers undergoing financial dificulty during the lockdown - ended up successfully achieving 80% overdue payments.
• Improved accuracy of customer accounts by implementing new auditing process to check for inaccurate or unusual account statuses, addresses, payment terms and pending arrangements.
• Maintain proficiency in data entry via Customer Information Control System (CICS) and other technologies and resources.
• Created and published training material on companys portal for new staf and inter department access.
• Reviewed and processed customer and business payments, including direct debits and check deposits whilst following up with the customers to collect information and verifying details.
• Reduced bad debt by 10% by analysing delinquent accounts by creating customer survey and regularly updating CFO of the payment problems.
• Regularly attended DHHS seminar and trainings with senior compliance manager and trained team members on the industry changes
• Assisted senior sales manager in designing new posters, web designs, system design, ofice set up for all utilities and services.

• MAJOR

Credit Controller (Casual at Cengage Learning Australia &
  • Australia - Melbourne
  • March 2019 to May 2019

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Accounts and query management of 700+ high profile and enterprise clients including universities, bookstores, apple, amazon etc. via interstate and international portfolio through AS400. Constantly contacting delinquent customers to secure payment.
• Manually calling, investigating, and resolving any enquiries regarding account or payment irregularities
• Initiating collections proceedings against accounts past due more than 6 months
• Generating invoices, statement of accounts, credit, and adjustment notes, resolving high volume payments and finance related discrepancies during peak season time.
• Responsible for providing an optimum level of customer support and service to the internal and external customers of Cengage with proven experience and confidence in phone collection.
• Reconciling accounts in USD and AUD on a daily basis.
• Working with customers in order to develop repayment plans for delinquent accounts.
• Processing credit card payments, direct debits and reconciliation of weekly credit card payments.
• Tracking all money received and preparing deposits on a daily basis along with data compilation.
• Anticipating customers needs, handling inquiries, solving problems by negotiation whilst utilising interpersonal skills and building and maintain relationship with the customers.
• MAJOR ACHIEVEMENTS:
• Successfully contacted over 500+ customers in a months time and collected payments worth $500k.
• Followed up with regions personnel on all Final Accounts Presented Not Settled and reported to Accounts. Receivable Manager in ATB review each Friday obtaining 35% of the payments by EOFY.

Credit/Risk Assessment Oficer at PFD Food Services Australi
  • Australia - Scoresby
  • June 2018 to March 2019

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Ensure that processes and procedures between the new takeover and business are done in an efective and timely manner through review and communication.
• Conducting and analysing credit checks on a daily basis for over 45-50 businesses, individuals and public bodies including schools, health/aged care centres, hospitals, airlines, universities etc.
• Opening new credit and cash accounts in the system after obtaining suficient information to assess the creditworthiness of newly proposed and existing customers ensuring company policies are always adhered to.
• Setting up child accounts in the system for major businesses like Woolworths, Metcash, IGA, Red Rooster, Emirates etc.
• Preparing comprehensive reports describing credit limit recommendations to the key accounting managers on a weekly basis.
• Generated daily banking deposits, verified balance receipts, and reconciled banking transactions daily.
• Processing and uploading bank statements in a timely manner for the managers and credit team to view first thing in the morning.
• Setting up direct debits on the ANZ portal on a weekly basis whilst reconciling credit card and COD receipts.
• Investigated account transactions to identify and resolve discrepancies relating to short payments, over payments and unidentified cash receipts.
• Keying in unapplied payments to the relevant account after thorough research and analysis.
• Keying in the BPAY payments daily
• Running unallocated report twice a week and keying in the payments after investigation ensuring all receipts and credits are correctly allocated.
• Processing refunds on a weekly basis
• Looking after 4xGeneric mailboxes, sorting, and distributing credit emails
• Preparing remits for the next day through generic mailbox and ANZ payment portal.
• Maintaining unidentified (EFT clearing) account, transactions, and spreadsheet.

• MAJOR ACHIEVEMENTS:
• Successfully completed credit checks for over 3k accounts after the takeover and assisted senior manager with additional ad-hoc duties.
• Revamped A/R procedures and filing systems by creating spreadsheets to enhance the tracking of receivables.
• Achieved both individual and team goals of clearing up the backlog in a timely manner during high pressure time as the business had just taken over was undergoing many internal changes.

Data Analyst at Probe Group Australi
  • Australia - Caulfield
  • February 2017 to June 2018

RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Credit Management of 5000+ commercial business accounts for Telstra, Optus, AGL, Origin and numerous other clients financially worth AUD 10 Mil+ via SAP whilst resolving queries over the phone and via 3xGeneric Electronic Mailboxes to administer and resolve accounts related queries for customers nationally and internationally.
• Setting up new accounts and conducting credit checks, washing, and validating the data to ensure accurate information is available.
• Raising and Generating invoices, statements, credit, and adjustment notes in a timely manner to resolve any queries via phone and over the email.
• Payment allocation and receipting daily, Unallocation and Reallocation per customers requests whilst resolving payments and finance related discrepancies in a fast-paced environment via extensive reconciliations including invoice and account/ledger reconciliations for external and internal reporting purposes.
• Reconciliations of 40-50 accounts daily in SAP for processing of any under and over payments.
• Updating and setting up automated processes for invoices, statements, and reports for external and internal clients.
• Perform journal entry for refunds, credits and payments processed on the customers accounts.
• Processing credit card payments, direct debits, and reconciliation of weekly credit card payments for online payment portal - SecurePay.
• Provide assistance in the preparation of financial statements (ATB, Cash Flow Statement) and monthly budget for month-end reporting and accruals.
• Ensuring efective and eficient internal controls within business units are in place.
• Analysed financial condition of high risk and high visibility customer and recommended courses of action to legal team including necessary risk mitigation.
• Conducting regular data wash and data validation on accounts referred on a daily basis to ensure all data received from client is up to date.
• Maintaining daily activity tracker and data collector report to make decisions that will improve the eficiency of work.
• Maintain, complete, and accurately record all the financial correspondence, and general ofice duties.

Education

Master's degree, Masters of Business Management
  • at Monash University
  • January 2025
High school or equivalent, Diploma in Accounting
  • at Monarch Institute
  • January 2024

Specialties & Skills

AUDITING
CREDIT MANAGEMENT
CUSTOMER SERVICE
BANK RECONCILIATIONS
ACCOUNTING
ACCRUALS
DATA ENTRY
BILLING
CUSTOMER INFORMATION CONTROL SYSTEM (CICS)
DRAWING