Job title: Senior Administration Assistant

Salary: B3 *GBP*25,584 - *GBP*27,269

Hours: 37

Contract:Permanent

Location:Knowsthorpe Gate

As a senior administration assistant, you will thrive on being part of a team that provides housing support for the most vulnerable people in Leeds.

Leeds City Council is one of the largest employers in the region with over 14,000 employees. We seek to recruit and develop talented individuals who embody our council values and ambitions.

About you

As a senior administration assistant, you will bring to the role:

• The interpersonal and communication skills required to deal with a wide range of people including face-to-face, telephone and written communication skills. Including the processes for dealing with varied information with a range of audiences.
• Be able to work with, and within, multiple teams of staff and contribute to its development with suggestions for new ways of working.
• Have experience of working on your own and using your initiative to adhere to timescales and deadlines.
• Bring your knowledge of the applications, systems and IT programmes utilised by the service and being able to accurately record and retrieve information
• Bring you experience and understanding of the importance of providing excellent customer services and experience of dealing positively with challenging situations.

About the role

This role is with providing administration support to the Private Sector Housing Team based at Knowsthorpe Gate, this is an office-based role.

By providing administrative support you will find this is a rewarding role, you will deal with a range of enquiries by phone and by email by all stakeholders including the general public, elected members, external and internal partners, etc.

You would be required to deal with sensitive and confidential information professionally and in accordance with strict deadlines and information governance requirements. You will also be required to deal with finance requests and raise orders and invoices. You will work closely with housing officers to improve the lives of those who live in the private sector. A DBS check will be required for this post.

What we offer you

We take pride in offering the best employee experience, with benefits including:

• a competitive salary and annual leave entitlement plus statutory holidays
• membership of the West Yorkshire Pension Fund with generous employer contributions
• flexible and hybrid working arrangements subject to service requirements
• a clear career pathway and continuing professional development opportunities
• a range of staff benefits to help you boost your wellbeing and make your money go further

How to apply

Please complete the online application form.

Read our guidance for further advice. Please check your information carefully and ensure you complete all sections before submitting your application.

If you have any queries or would like an informal chat about the role please contact Gareth Jones Administration Supervisor on 0113 37 86310.

A Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check against the Children or Adultsbarred list as applicable will be carried out on preferred candidates. Read ourrecruitment of ex-offenders policy.

We welcome applications from everyone and actively seek a diverse range of applicants from all backgrounds and cultures. We particularly encourage applications from, but not limited to, women, carers, veterans as well as LGBT+, ethnically diverse, disabled and care experienced people.

This role is based in the UK. Home Office guidance states that candidates must evidence their right to work in the UK prior to commencing employment, either as a UK or Irish citizen, under the EU Settlement scheme or having secured any other relevant work visa.

If you do not have the right to work in the UK, you must consider your own eligibility for sponsorship for a particular role through theSkilled Worker visa route before applying.To be eligible for sponsorship you'll usually need to be paid the standard salary rate of at least *GBP*38,700 per year or meet one of the other eligibility criteria. Ensure you are eligible before applying.

Job Description

Shared Services consists of employees in the Business Support Centre, Business Administration Service and Contact Centre. These services provide administration support activities to a wide range of teams and services across the council. We help the council to streamline operations by redesigning processes, reviewing models of delivery to enable better sharing of resources and exploiting existing or introducing new technology to modernise the way we work.

Our staff use a range of computer programmes and systems to support services which include those working with teams based across the council in a number of different administration roles.The role involves hybrid working (home/office dependant on service need), potentially working face-to-face with customers and working within the council boundaries as required.

Specific team job purposes are listed below.

Responsibilities:

• Work with high levels of accuracy for tasks such as checking documents and recording numerical and alphabetical information.
• Identify problems and areas for improvement and offer solutions.
• Support staff and develop new team members.
• Use initiative and judgement where appropriate, providing outcomes and solutions for customers from a range of options.Work on your own, manage your own workload and use your initiative to adhere to time scales and deadlines.
• Carry out a range of administrative duties.
• Collate data and use it to produce reports.
• Understand legal business, financial, audit, confidential and operational requirements of the service, and the impact on its day-to-day work.
• Maintain effective relationships with other Leeds City Council staff, Elected Members, members of the public and other partnership organisations as appropriate.
• Work flexibly moving within service areas, working at different locations depending on service demand
• Flexible and adaptable to change to assist other services as required commensurate to grade
• Participate in appraisal, training and development activities as necessary to ensure up to date knowledge and skills
• Improve own practice through observation, evaluation, discussion with colleagues and development programmes.
• Work collaboratively with colleagues, knowing when to seek help and advice.
• Contribute to the overall ethos, work, and aims of the service by attending relevant meetings, training days/events as requested.
• Be aware of and comply with Leeds City Council policies and procedures e.g. child protection, health, safety and security, confidentiality and data protection, reporting all concerns to an appropriate person
• Be aware of and support difference and ensure equality for all working in an anti-discriminatory manner, upholding and promoting the values, standards and equal opportunities of Leeds City Council.
• Recognise and appropriately challenge any incidents of racism, bullying, harassment or victimisation and any form of abuse of equal opportunities, ensuring compliance with relevant policies and procedures.
• The Council has adopted a flexibility protocol and this role will be expected to work within these parameters.
• The duties outlined are not meant as an exhaustive list and will also comprise any other duties within the spirit of the post commensurate with the job evaluation outcome for this post.

Qualifications: Qualifications demonstrating ability in numeracy and literacy or equivalent knowledge

PERSONAL SPECIFICATION

ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENTS: It is essential that the Candidate should be able to demonstrate the following criteria for the post within the context of the specific role duties and responsibilities: Candidates will only be shortlisted for interview if they can demonstrate on the application form that they meet all the essential requirements.

Method of Assessment will be through one or more of the following Application Form, Test, Interview or Certificate.

Skills Required

• Well-developed interpersonal and communication skills with a wide range of people including face-to-face, telephone and written communication skills. Including the processes for dealing with varied information with a range of audiences.
• Able to work with, and within, multiple teams of staff and contribute to its development with suggestions for new ways of working

Knowledge Required

• Knowledge of the applications, systems and IT programmes utilised by the service and being able to accurately record and retrieve information.

Experience Required

• Of working on your own and using your initiative to adhere to timescales and deadlines.
• Experience and understanding of the importance of providing excellent customer services
• Of dealing positively with challenging situations.

Behavioural & other Characteristics required

• Committed to continuous improvement.
• Able to understand and observe Leeds City Council Equality and Diversity Policies.
• Carry out all duties having regard to an employee responsibility under Health & Safety Policies.
• Willingness to actively participate in training and development activities to ensure up to date knowledge, skills and continuous professional development
• Understand and embrace our values, behaviours and codes of conduct.

DESIRABLE REQUIREMENTS: It is desirable that the Candidate should be able to demonstrate the following criteria for the post within the context of the specific role duties and responsibilities: Candidates are not required to meet all the Desirable requirements however these may be used to distinguish between acceptable candidates.

Knowledge Required

• Safeguarding

Specific Job Purposes

Leeds Homes Team This role provides administration support to the Leeds Homes Teams by working in partnership with Housing Management and Registered Provider partners on matters associated with the Housing Register and property lettings. You would be required to administer, maintain and update databases and spreadsheets whilst using initiative to work accurately to deadlines.

Private Sector Housing - To provide an effective and efficient administration and support service as part of a business support pool serving the Private Sector Housing in Statutory Housing.

Primary areas of work to include, providing administration support to the operational service as allocated, preparing routine forms and correspondence, collating and prepare information from a variety of sources, operating standard office ICT applications, operating service specific ICT and information systems, and being prepared to work flexibly across different disciplines in the Service.

Housing Registration Team -

This role is to work as part of the housing application registrations team processing customers online applications as they come into the online work queue and to support housing advisers and customer services around the verification of housing applications.

The officer will have an agreed minimum number of applications to verify daily and either contact the customer requesting further information to be able to proceed with their application or activate the application as all the proofs have been supplied by the customer.

Key stake holders are customers, housing advisers and external partners supporting vulnerable applicants. The service receives an average 350-400 application to process a week the role of the officer will have an agreed target of 25 new applications a day to process.

Key parts of the role are to process proofs provided, identify if customers are trying to register duplicate applications, apply the eligibility test, and ensure that the correct bedrooms are applied to applications.

LHO - Homelessness Services

This full-time role is based with Housing Options at Merrion House, this is based with the Homelessness service. Completing Housing Benefit claims for people in temporary accommodation.

• Processing invoices and payments.
• Data input/managing trackers (for example, referrals from partners for homelessness assessments, people placed in temporary accommodation/discharged)
• Processing tenancy bond requests from customers
• Accessing our system, manipulating data, pulling reports, adding reminders (Abritas)
• Processing referrals on behalf of customers - for example, victims of domestic abuse, people requiring supported accommodation.
• Sanctuary Scheme data capture and referral (this scheme is safety measures for victims of domestic abuse).
• Assisting with various inboxes (review panel, housing options - using templates to respond or acknowledging requests).

Apply for this job