Description
Provide professional and efficient front line financial customer services for staff, students and visitors of the College, accurately receiving, processing and reconciling cash or card payments for fees and additional costs received by the College. Provide a friendly and approachable service to students, their parents and carers who are applying for support under one of the College’s student financial support funds, processing student support funds applications and administering the resulting awards, communicating the outcomes to students and College departments via telephone, email and post as applicable, in accordance with College policies, procedures and guidelines and any relevant legislation.
This role is 37 hours a week and 52 weeks a year.
Main Responsibilities and Duties:
The following is an indication of the type and level of the main priorities expected of this role as directed by your line manager and is not intended to be a comprehensive list of duties or tasks:
1. Provide financial services for students, staff, visitors and all College stakeholders, handling and processing cash, cheques and credit card payments for courses and trips, receiving and processing applications for student financial funds, including providing funding and bursary information and advice to students and parents/ guardians as required. This will include, accepting and checking financial support applications ensuring all of the necessary and essential information is provided by the student.
2. Maintain financial records for audit purposes and ensure that all financial transactions are completed in accordance with College Financial policies and processes.
3. Provide a welcoming and friendly customer focused service to students, parent/ guardians and staff, processing petty cash, hardship payments and bus passes following the College financial procedures.
4. Act as the initial point of enquiry for students and new applicants, directing them to the most appropriate college department or referring them internally to a member of the Threshold Services Team.
5. Support the work of the Student Financial Support team, providing concise accurate information whilst remaining within professional boundaries and knowledge, assessing household income and make initial decisions on awards against set criteria, providing printed information on the support available to College students and processing applications and other paperwork as required. This will include attending open evenings, open days and careers fairs as required to promote the services available within the College Student Finance desk.
6. Support the department by being a consistent customer facing presence becoming someone students recognise and trust, providing telephone and face to face advice on the most appropriate fund for students to apply to, keeping accurate and detailed records of interactions with applicants and the outcomes.
7. Support the department at Open Evenings by providing information on support facilities to potential students and their parents/ carers. This will include participating in the planning and delivery of campaigns to raise awareness of the available funds.
8. Liaise with Job Centre Plus, Social Services, Foster Parents, Connexions and other external agencies, in order to assist students as required.
9. Proactively work with the College Personal Developments Tutors and other college support services to identify students who are at risk or vulnerable and can be supported financially and work with departments to identify students who require support to assist them in applying for funds.
In addition all post holders will be required trained to act as Fire Marshals and First Aiders.
Application Requirements
To ensure compliance with safeguarding guidelines, all applicants must complete the application form in full. This includes providing:
* A full employment history from the time you left full-time education, with details of any gaps in employment explained.
* Information on all relevant education and qualifications.
Please note, incomplete applications will not be considered. Your co-operation helps us maintain the highest standards of safety and care for children and young people.
Benefits
Click here to view MidKent College benefits.
A GOOD local College for Maidstone and Medway
Every year over 6000 students from Medway, Maidstone and beyond choose MidKent College to continue their studies and prepare for their future career.
Our sparkling campuses in Maidstone and Medway boast some of the best vocational training facilities in the country as well as staff and student social zones and more. Our University Centre Maidstone campus provides a valuable higher education and professional training centre for Maidstone, including South East Institute of Technology and the College's Home Energy Centre. Additionally, in September 2024 we proudly opened Medway School of Arts in Chatham's Historic Dockyard.
All of our campuses benefit from ongoing investment programmes so that we can provide fantastic learning environments for our students.
For over 100 years we've been providing high-quality technical training and apprenticeships in a range of subject areas.
In October 2024 Ofsted rated the College as 'Good'.
Commitment to Safeguarding
We are committed to the safeguarding of all our students and staff. This means everyone who works here is required to actively protect them from preventable harm. Our recruitment and selection process includes background checks which will be undertaken on the successful applicant, including an enhanced DBS, and in your application you are required to demonstrate how you meet the Colleges requirements on safeguarding.
The background checks will be carried-out in accordance with the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Code of Practice. The DBS helps employers make safer recruitment decisions and prevent unsuitable people from working with vulnerable groups, including children. We operate in accordance with the DBS Code of Conduct and Privacy Policy. You can access both of these documents at https://www.midkent.ac.uk/about-us/policy-and-privacy-information
MidKent College is committed to safeguarding and the Prevent Agenda and to promoting the welfare of children and we expect all staff to share this commitment. MKC complies fully with the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Code of Practice regarding the correct handling, storage, retention and disposal of Disclosures and Disclosure information, and undertakes not to discriminate unfairly against any subject of a disclosure on the basis of a conviction or other information revealed.
Since the post for which you are applying may involve unsupervised access to children and vulnerable adults, it will be exempt from the provisions of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and amendments to the Exceptions Order 1975, 2013 and 2020. It is an offence to apply for this role if you are barred from engaging in regulated activity relevant to children or young people. Candidates who are preliminarily offered a position for such posts will be required to disclose details, cautions (including final warnings or reprimands), or convictions which are not "protected" as defined by the Exceptions Order 1975, 2013 and 2020 or any other matters that may be relevant to their suitability to work for the College including sanctions relating to work with children in any country outside of the UK.
Please note that the College is unable to consider an application further if the candidate declines to complete the Disclosure form.
Commitment to Equal Opportunities
As a proud user of the disability confident scheme the College is committed to equal opportunities and celebrates the diversity of staff and students. As part of our commitment to the scheme, we guarantee to interview all disabled applicants who meet the minimum criteria for a vacancy.
We welcome applications from anyone wishing to work flexibly and those considering a return to work from a career break.
Important Notice for Applicants: Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) Requirement
To ensure the security of our college systems and protect personal / sensitive information, all staff are now required to use Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) should your application be successful. This mandated security measure helps reduce the risk of unauthorised access aligned to our cyber security requirements.
Should your application be successful, MFA can be enabled using the Microsoft Authenticator app on your personal or college mobile device. Alternatively, you may request a YubiKey, a physical security key that plugs into your allocated laptop or desktop.