Senior Management Accountant; Retail

£47,000 - £54,000 (+ Benefits)

Reports to: Retail Finance Manager

Department: Chief Operating Office

Contract: 7 month Fixed Term Contract

Hours: Full time 35 hours per week

Location: Stratford, London Office-based with high flexibility (1-2 days per week in the office).

Visa sponsorship: You must be eligible to work in the UK to apply for this vacancy. Cancer Research UK is not able to offer visa sponsorship.

Closing date: 9th October 2026 23:55

Recruitment process: One to two competency-based interviews

Interview date: Please note that applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and the vacancy may close before the advertised closing date if a suitable number of applications are received. We encourage interested candidates to apply as early as possible.

At Cancer Research UK, we exist to beat cancer.

We are professionals with purpose, beating cancer every day. But we need to go much further and much faster. That's why we're looking for someone talented, someone who wants to develop their skills, someone like you.

Cancer Research UK's Finance team's credibility and professionalism in handling money fund raised by public generosity is essential to the smooth running and future ambitions of our organisation, ultimately helping the charity reach our goal of beating cancer. We're looking for a Senior Management Accountant to join Cancer Research UK's Fundraising Finance team to own and deliver the management accounts across our Retail & Trading teams, which raised £126m in 2024/25 towards our life‑saving work.

In this role, you'll collaborate closely with the Finance team and Retail budget holders to ensure accurate management accounts, financial reporting, financial planning, and robust financial controls. You will provide insightful financial guidance to Retail budget holders to inform key decision‑making through a period of significant change.

You will also have the opportunity to line manage the Retail Management Accountant, while leading on process improvements, standardisation, and the adoption of best practices across the team.

If you are a qualified Management Accountant who has worked in a large, complex organisation and thrives in building collaborative and credible stakeholder relationships, we'd love for you to join our mission.

Financial Reporting:

• Owning and delivering timely, high‑quality, and accurate management accounts and other business‑critical reports for Cancer Research UK's network of hundreds of stores and distribution hubs.
  • This includes retail fixed assets and stock accounting.
• Collaborating with your finance team and budget holders to understand major variances to plan/prior years, while ensuring budget holders understand and take responsibility for performance and variances to the financial plan.
• Reviewing management information to find efficiencies and improvements to ensure focus on the organisation's top priorities.
• Training budget holders to ensure they can confidently interpret financial information (including self‑service accounts/transaction lists) and demonstrate strong budget control.
• Using your financial judgement and expertise to support budget holders in navigating a period of change and inform key decisions aligned with Cancer Research UK's Trading Strategy.

Accounting and Year‑End:

• Collaborating with your finance team and trading budget holders to identify and process transactions needed to ensure accounts are complete and correct.
• Owning a range of accounting adjustments (including stock, fixed assets, and rent).
• Identifying and implementing improvements and efficiencies in Cancer Research UK's management accounting processes while maintaining strong financial controls.
• Being a key finance point for…