Principal Accountant – Job Group -N

For appointment to this grade, an officer must have: –
(i)Served in the grade of Chief Accountant, job group ‘M’ for a minimum period of three (3) years;
(ii)Bachelor’s degree in any of the following fields: – Accounting, Finance, Commerce (Accounting or Finance option), Business Administration (Accounting or Finance option), Business Management (Accounting or Finance option) from a recognized institution and passed Part II of the Certified Public Accountant (CPA) Examination;
OR
Any other relevant equivalent qualification plus Part III of the Certified Public Accountant (CPA) Examination or its recognized equivalent;
(iii)Membership of the Institute of Certified Public Accountant of Kenya (ICPAK);
(iv)Certificate in computer applications or data base management or enterprise resource management from a recognized institution;
(v)Certificate in Management Course lasting not less than four (4) weeks from a recognized Institution; and
(vi)Shown merit and ability as reflected in work performance and results;
(vii)Enter Most recent evaluated Staff Performance Appraisal score on the field SPA.

Duties and Responsibilities
An officer at this level will be responsible for the following duties and responsibilities: – Receiving and analyzing financial reports from public sector entities; maintaining a database of all public-sector entities; providing technical advice; reviewing the quality of financial statements; preparing the annual consolidated financial report for the County;

developing training materials; capturing exchequer issues and receipts in the system; reconciling bank statements with exchequer issues and receipts; raising exchequer requisition for the County and counties;

ensuring safe custody of County government assets and records; preparing management reports in accordance with the financial orders and regulations; and verifying payment advice (PA) forms. The officer at this level will also be responsible for:

raising accounting debt entries; processing payments, reimbursements and disbursements; recording proceeds of domestic debt; preparing annual final accounts; verifying payment and receipt vouchers and committal documents; capturing data; maintaining primary records such as cashbooks, ledgers, vote books; preparing management reports;

keeping safe custody of Accounting records and assets; receiving duly processed payments and receipt vouchers; writing cheques, posting payments and receipt vouchers in the cash books;

authorizing payments and signing cheques subject to set limit; balancing and ruling of the cash books as provided; and ensuring security of cheques and cheque books. In addition, the officer will be responsible for: verifying Authority to Incur Expenditure (AIE) in the system and filing returns; preparing Appropriation in Aid (AIA) returns;

verifying invoices; preparing accounting and management reports in the system; uploading accounting data into the system; coordinating closure of the monthly accounting periods; verifying users in the preparation of final accounts;

reviewing business process; providing user support on accounting processes and system setup; and training and development of staff.