Senior Payment Specialist - Finance Department

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Job Description
- Senior Payment Specialist
- Finance Department (260006LQ)

Job Description

Senior Payment Specialist
- Finance Department - (260006LQ)

The Finance Department of the Committee for Public Counsel Services, the public defender agency for Massachusetts, is seeking a full-time Senior Payment Specialist to assist in ensuring the timely and efficient process of legal and other payments of agency obligations.

DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION MISSION STATEMENT

CPCS is committed to protecting the fundamental constitutional and human rights of our assigned clients through zealous advocacy, community-oriented defense, and the fullness of excellent legal representation. We are dedicated to building and maintaining strong professional relationships, while striving to accept, listen to and respect the diverse circumstances of each client, as we dedicate ourselves to meeting their individual needs. It is our CPCS mission to achieve these goals, and in furtherance thereof, we embrace and endorse diversity, equityand inclusion as our core values as we maintain a steadfast commitment to: (1) Ensure that CPCS management and staff members represent a broad range of human differences and experience;

(2) Provide a work climate that is respectful and supports success; and (3) Promote the dignity and well-being of all staff members. CPCS leadership is responsible for ensuring equity, diversity, and inclusion. The ability to achieve these goals with any level of certainty is ultimately the responsibility of each member of the CPCS community.

CPCS is the state agency in Massachusetts responsible for providing an attorney when the state or federal constitution or a state statute requires the appointment of an attorney for a person who cannot afford to retain one. The agency provides representation in criminal, delinquency, youthful offender, family regulation, guardianship, mental health, sexually dangerous person, and sex offender registry cases, as well as in appeals and post-conviction and post-judgment proceedings related to those matters.

The clients we represent are diverse across every context imaginable and bring many unique cultural dimensions to the matters we address. This reality creates a critical need for CPCS staff to be culturally competent and able to work well with people of different races, ethnicities, genders and/or sexual orientation identities, abilities, and limited English proficiency, among other protected characteristics.

The CPCS Finance Department is responsible for all financial functions within the agency. These include, but are not limited to:
Budget, Accounting, Procurement, Accounts Payable, Payroll Data, Security, Internal Control Compliance, Audit & Oversight Conformity, Fixed Assets, Federal Grants, Records Management, and Facilities.

The Senior Payment Specialist supports the Finance Department with responsibilities including the timely review, payment, and reconciliations of agency obligations. The Senior Payment Specialist follows Commonwealth and CPCS fiscal policies and procedures to support the agency, vendors and private attorneys. The Senior Payment Specialist is expected to effectively communicate with all levels of the organization, external relationships and oversight agencies in this role.

The duties of the Senior Payment Specialist include, but are not limited to:

• Processing the timely payments for over 3,000 attorneys and 2,000 expert vendors and performing transmission of payment files to the Office of the State Comptroller;
• Processing payments for all other agency goods and services, including discounts as backup and/or as needed;
• Ensuring the appropriate billing mechanisms for payments exist (e.g. NACs, Encumbrance) to ensure timely and appropriate payments;
• Providing technical expertise to V-bill/E-bill systems as well as other Finance systems as needed;
• Providing customer support to V-bill/E-bill systems users as needed and communicating billing information to private attorneys and vendors using Constant Contact and Ebill/Vbill Notice;
• Developing standard and custom queries using the Commonwealth Information Warehouse (CIW) for accurate payment, case spending…