Vacancy Name2026 Finance Graduate Vacancy NoVN1085 Job TypePermanent LocationHatfield Job Details
Finance Graduate Scheme 2026
Contract type: Permanent
Scheme Start Date: September 2026
Location: Hatfield (Blended working - 3 days in the office)
Working hours per week: 40 hours
Level: Entry Level - Graduate
Application Opening Date: Monday 20th October
Application Closing Date: Sunday 9th November
Starting Salary: £32,500
To read more about Ocado Retail and our Graduate schemes, visit our!
About Us
Our mission is to deliver joy in every shop, through unbeatable choice, unrivalled service, and reassuringly good value.
We’re Ocado Retail, a market-leading, joint venture between Ocado Group and M&S and the world’s largest dedicated online supermarket. Not only is Ocado.com the only place to shop a full range of M&S food online, it’s also the home to the widest online supermarket range in the UK and champion of small, independent brands. We’re also the brains behind, our same-day grocery delivery service.
Finance at Ocado Retail
The Finance team at Ocado Retail is embedded as key partners to teams across the business - from Buying to Marketing to Operations - adding value and delivering on both immediate and long-term strategy. Our commercial mindset, analytical eye, and control focus enable the business to deliver long-term, sustainable growth.
What you’ll do
The scheme covers 3 years and will see Ocado Retail support you to achieve the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) qualification alongside three 1-year rotations across different teams within Finance, whilst also gaining exposure to the various areas of the business. Your rotations will see you working across three of the following Finance areas:
1. Commercial Finance - with a seat at the table you will be helping the business make decisions to improve product profitability and customer experience, driving business performance
2. Financial Planning & Analysis - with a birds-eye view of the whole company you will be helping set business targets and reporting back to senior stakeholders on performance
3. Commercial Operations - with an ear to the ground you will be helping make key investment decisions to expand our network, improve operational efficiencies, and ensure we are making the right commercial decisions with our stock
4. Customer - with an eye on the customer journey, you’ll be helping to assess our marketing strategy, advertising campaigns, and customer propositions to improve our customer acquisition and retention efforts
5. Accounting Centre of Excellence - our ACE team takes responsibility for key month-end and accounting activities, with a team who apply their accounting expertise and continuous improvement mindset to create an efficient, accurate, and well-controlled financial environment
Who you are
6. Someone who is passionate about understanding the retail e-commerce environment, identifying business, market trends and understands customer behaviours and what makes a business profitable
7. An analytical and a data-driven individual who can apply Excel skills to manipulate data and identify what it is telling us
8. Someone with the ability to build and develop relationships across the business to deliver the best results for our customers
9. Most importantly, those who exhibit our core values: always be curious, bring your best self and challenge what's possible!
Expectations During and After the Scheme
10. You’ll get three rotations in teams across Finance, learning on the job, supported by your manager. There is also optional access to a Mentor and a Buddy to support you with getting settled into the business and kick-starting your career.
11. You will also have CIMA tuition through an external provider to help you complete your qualification, with an assigned Grad Lead. To help you study, you will have allocated time from your working hours and additional time off for study, revision, and exams.
12. On top of that, you’ll be given exposure to the Finance Leadership Team through biannual demonstrations of your work, giving you crucial experience in creating presentations and speaking to senior members of the Finance team.
13. Successful graduates will roll off the scheme after 3 years into a permanent position within the Finance team based on personal preference, performance during the scheme and ability level (dependent on role availability)
What You Need To Apply
14. CV & Cover Letter - Why Ocado Retail? Why this scheme? What do you hope to achieve/gain?
15. Commercial awareness and problem-solving ability
16. Excel skills an advantage but not essential
17. Graduate with a 2.1 or above from an accredited UK University
18. The legal right to work in the United Kingdom upon scheme commencement and duration of the scheme
In the spirit of innovation, we welcome you to use AI tools in your application, just as we use them in our own business at Ocado Retail. However, as you leverage this technology, please don't lose sight of the most important element: your unique self. Your experiences, passions, and personality are what truly set you apart. Ensure that your application still authentically conveys who you are and why you're a great fit for us.
When will you hear from us?
We love that we get loads of amazing applications for our graduate schemes. To recognise that, we aim to keep you informed throughout the process.
To start with, we’ll take a look through each application and whether successful or not, we’ll let you know. Applications will close on Sunday 9th November 2025. Our aim is to be in touch with anyone who’s applied within 2 weeks of that date.
After that, we’ll keep you informed between each stage. Given how many great applications we get, it can take some time, so please bear with us in between updates.
We treat all applications respectfully and fairly so unfortunately, if you miss the closing date we won't be able to make exceptions to extend stages. This wouldn't be fair to those candidates who have completed them!
How will we contact you?
Our Learning & Development Promise
There are great opportunities to grow careers within our high-performing and innovative business. These range from deepening your experience and expertise to potentially taking on management responsibility or even pivoting your career to do something completely different.
Our career management principles exist to help the realisation of career ambitions, whatever they might be.
Driven by you
You are in the driving seat of your career. We all have a responsibility to do the things that can help move our careers forward. That could mean completing some learning, using our career stories to understand how your colleagues have got to where they are today, or applying for a new role.
Supported by your manager
You should feel that you can have open and productive conversations with your manager about your career and development. They are there to coach you, act as a mentor, signpost opportunities and be an advocate for you within the business.
Backed by ORL
We are committed to ensuring that the right tools are there for you. Our learning system ‘Walnut’ is your one-stop shop for all your learning needs.
What’s in it for you
By joining Ocado Retail you’ll have the chance to experience life at the world’s largest online retailer, work with an amazing bunch of people who challenge what’s possible each day, and grow your skills and career in online retail.
If that’s not enough to tempt you, you’ll also get access to loads of great benefits to sweeten the deal. Here’s a taste of what we offer:
Health & Wellbeing: Private medical insurance with the option to add your family, Digital GP appointments, market-leading family policies, mental health support, discounted gym memberships, dental insurance, and more.
Spend & Save: Annual bonus scheme split between personal and business objectives, recognition with reward platform, up to 7% matched pension contributions, 15% Ocado discount, 20% M&S discount, free breakfast every day in the office, electric vehicle leasing scheme and free shuttle bus from Hatfield station to the office.
Never miss the moments that matter: Blended/Hybrid working, 26 days holiday plus 8 flexible bank holidays, options to buy an extra holiday, 2 weeks work from anywhere, and lifestyle break opportunities.
Everyone’s welcome
We’re an equal opportunities employer. That means that we make sure all potential colleagues are treated fairly and equally. If you require reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process, please let us know on the application form.