Finance Apprentice

Summary

The highly established European Consortium for Political Research, located in Colchester, Essex, is seeking to employ a Finance Apprentice. The successful candidate will assist the Finance Team with daily processing tasks, finance administration and other finance duties, including use of PayPal, BOS and more.

Wage

£14,133.60 for your first year, then could increase depending on your age

National Minimum Wage rate for apprentices

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Generous pension scheme, up to 16%

Training course

Accounts or finance assistant (level 2)

Hours

Monday to Friday flexible hours between 8.00am and 7.00pm. Flexible lunches/breaks minimum 20 minutes.

36 hours a week

Start date

Wednesday 1 October 2025

Duration

1 year

Positions available

1

Work

Most of your apprenticeship is spent working. You’ll learn on the job by getting hands-on experience.

What you'll do at work

Day-to-day tasks will include:

Download PayPal and Stripe
Download BOS
Download credit card transactions
Download Caxton transactions and add to Expenses app
Check email inboxes for urgent items to respond to
Update BOS payments on website
Download Event Registrations reports from website
Add paid items to Daily Import Sheet
Post BOS EUR receipts to Sage
Post BOS GBP receipts or add to Daily Import Sheet
Export transactions from Access and add to Daily Import Sheet
Sage check-data, back-up, update Audit Trail Daily Report
Import Daily Import Sheet ensuring that correct VAT values and codes have been entered
Download invoices from website and save, ensuring the correct VAT rate and number has been used for the country of the event
Raise outstanding event registration credit notes
Copy and paste SG items to SG spreadsheet
Start new import sheet for the following working day
Post PayPal transactions to Sage
Process remaining items from email inboxes, ensuring purchase invoices reflect the relevant country's VAT number
Update WL from payments app
Add WL items to the Daily Import Sheet for the following day
Import Access import sheet
Debtors & Creditors checking
Schedule publications items for the following month

Where you'll work

Harbour House
6-8 Hythe Quay
Colchester
Essex
CO2 8JF

Training

Apprenticeships include time away from working for specialist training. You’ll study to gain professional knowledge and skills.

College or training organisation

COLCHESTER INSTITUTE

Your training course

Accounts or finance assistant (level 2)

Understanding apprenticeship levels (opens in new tab)

What you'll learn

Course contents

Record transactional data.
Use the organisation’s standard tools and processes to examine data to identify transactional issues such as, reconciliations and inconsistencies between invoices.
Recognise and rectify routine errors, escalating as necessary.
Plan and review accounting and finance tasks.
Communicate with stakeholders to deliver accurate and timely results, avoiding jargon, using language tailored to the audience and different media methods with an appreciation of the risks and benefits to the business of social media and other digital applications.
Use finance and accounting software packages to accurately input and manage data to contribute to routine accounting tasks.
Handle data and digital technology in line with cyber and data security requirements, using data securely and safely, including backing up data.
Record transactional data.
Use the organisation’s standard tools and processes to examine data to identify transactional issues such as, reconciliations and inconsistencies between invoices.
Recognise and rectify routine errors, escalating as necessary.
Plan and review accounting and finance tasks.
Communicate with stakeholders to deliver accurate and timely results, avoiding jargon, using language tailored to the audience and different media methods with an appreciation of the risks and benefits to the business of social media and other digital applications.
Use finance and accounting software packages to accurately input and manage data to contribute to routine accounting tasks.
Handle data and digital technology in line with cyber and data security requirements, using data securely and safely, including backing up data.

Your training plan

The apprentice will be working towards the Accounts or Finance Assistant Level 2 apprenticeship standard, including the AAT Level 2 Certificate in Accounting
Classroom attendance at Colchester Institute (Colchester Campus) every other week

More training information

Colchester Institute has partnered with Mindful Education to deliver this apprenticeship through our online and on-campus model

Requirements

Essential qualifications

GCSE in:

5 GCSEs including maths and English (grade A*-C/9-4)

Let the company know about other relevant qualifications and industry experience you have. They can adjust the apprenticeship to reflect what you already know.

Skills

Communication skills
IT skills
Attention to detail
Organisation skills
Problem solving skills
Administrative skills
Number skills
Logical
Team working
Initiative
Non judgemental
Keen to learn
Keen to engage

Other requirements

Almost all work will be carried out on a computer as we are paper-free, therefore long hours on a PC will be expected. Hybrid working is offered 2 days a week, working from home.

About this company

The European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) was established by a group of twelve founding European universities and as the result of a project led by eminent political scientists, Jean Blondel and Stein Rokkan, to… "break down the barriers between the national traditions of the discipline and create a truly international community of scholars within Europe…" With the help of a generous grant from the Ford Foundation, the ECPR quickly built a framework of membership and activities to meet this mission. Fifty years on, we are the leading scholarly society for political scientists in Europe; we have over 300 institutional members in nearly 50 countries, which amounts to a global community of tens of thousands of scholars. We bring scholars together across our global network to develop research and grow the discipline. Through our events, publications and research groups, we foster scholarly collaboration across borders.

http://www.ecpr.eu (opens in new tab)

Company benefits

Employee benefits package including; Cycle to Work Scheme, Workplace Nursery Scheme and 24/7 Employee Assistance Programme. Also Free parking, 25 days Annual Leave plus Bank Holidays & Flexible working. As well as free tea, coffee and filtered water.

After this apprenticeship

There is potential for this role to be permanent. The finance department structure is:

Finance Apprentice
Finance Assistant
Finance Manager and Head of Compliance

There is not a lot of scope to move up in the company as it is small. However, we do support training and education so that employees may always be growing and developing.

Ask a question

The contact for this apprenticeship is:

COLCHESTER INSTITUTE

Colchester Institute - Apprenticeships Team

ci.apprenticeships@colchester.ac.uk

01206712043

The reference code for this apprenticeship is VAC1000331911.

Apply now

Closes on Friday 29 August 2025

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After signing in, you’ll apply for this apprenticeship on the company's website.

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