Financial Assistant

The position provides a broad variety of high level financial support to the Northwestern University Center for Audiology, Speech, Language and Learning (NUCASLL), an outpatient medical clinic providing care for over 7000 speech-language pathology, audiology and learning disabilities patients per year. The position supports the Clinical Faculty (Clinicians), Directors, Managers, Clients, Students, Physicians, and Staff. The successful candidate will demonstrate superb judgment, problem solving, and customer service skills to resolve routine and complex accounting and financial issues and handle information of a highly confidential and critical nature such as health information, health insurance claims, and patient demographic and financial information.

• Provides day-to-day financial & accounting support using an advanced knowledge of applicable skills, methods & practices & some innovation, analysis, & reasoning to choose appropriate alternatives from among pre-defined policies & procedures to complete work that includes successive steps & involves some non-routine problems &/or decisions.

• Revenue Cycle responsibility for the administration of patient/client account receivables, initial billing and follow-up on Third-party claims.
• Handles self-pay accounts, including financial assistance. Receipting, posting and preparing daily funds received to include direct posting to computer system.
• Handles customer inquiries regarding patient/client receivables.
• Applies industry and professional standards, university policy and procedure, federal and state laws and other regulations.
• Provides administrative &/or clerical support.
• Please highlight areas of responsibility below:
  • Accounting policy & procedure
  • Accounts payable
  • Accounts receivable
  • Additional/special pay
  • Analysis
  • Appropriation charges
  • Audit
  • Balancing
  • Bank and balance sheet acct
  • Bank deposits
  • Capital spending
  • Cash receipt
  • Chart &/or account coding
  • Cost accounting
  • Creating new accounts
  • Endowment and gift accounting
  • Expense reimbursement
  • Financial Statements
  • Forecasting
  • Grants &/or awards
  • Inventory
  • Investment asset accounting
  • Insurance Claims Processing and Account Reconciliation
  • Journal &/or ledger
  • Petty cash
  • Plant, debt & loan acct
  • Procurement card program
  • Purchase orders
  • Recharge
  • Reconciliation
  • Risk accounting
  • Reporting
  • Transfer charges
  • Treasury
  • Wire transfers

Specific Responsibilities:

Budget

• Maintains & tracks individual budget accounts.
• Updates calendar, spreadsheets, templates & forms; monitors submissions.
• Completes reconciliation procedures.
• Creates summary reports.
• Coordinates &/or provides information for annual salary review process.

Analysis, Statements & Reporting

• Prepares account, budget, cost, expenditure &/or funds analysis.
• Provides reports to managers in tracking payment status & notification when balances & activities do not comply with policy, procedures or are inadequately prepared.
• Creates reports & queries; reviews for incomplete records, data entry errors, &/or accounting mistakes.
• May analyze open encumbrances that are no longer valid & recommend appropriate modifications to ensure smooth processing of financial transactions.

Transactions:

• Completes & maintains transactions in enterprise systems.
• Provides review and oversight of all types of financial transactions some of which may be complex in regard to size or duration of account.
• Reviews; ensures approval based on alternatives regarding practice & policy.
• Troubleshoots problems.
• Performs vendor/account research as needed.
• Obtains additional information from or provides instruction & guidance for customers/vendors; corrects or escalates.
• Accesses multiple banking systems to process transactions, retrieve information, &/or initiate wire transfers, as it relates to patient claim information
  
• Provides financial policy interpretation to determine the validity of customer requests & ensure compliance.
• Contacts outside agencies, banks &/or banking systems to obtain clarification of rules &/or regulations.
• Enters information into database.

Grants &/or Awards

• Completes post award accounting.
• Approves expenditures on travel, consulting &/or equipment, along with various forms, such as Intra Institutional Vouchers, Requests for Accounting Corrections, the Research Assistant and Scholarship Appointments, &/or payroll adjustments, in accordance with granting agency guidelines & University policies & procedures.
• Processes subcontract payments according to rules & regulations of granting agencies.
• Reconciles subcontract payments.
• Corrects charges to various accounts.

Administration

• Provides excellent customer service, over the phone and in person answering standard questions regarding status of requests, policies and procedures for processing transactions, &/or instructions for completing paperwork. Specifically customer service regarding insurance claims for patients.
  
• Instructs & advises regarding options and appropriate courses of action & follows-up inquiries to ensure customer satisfaction.
• Completes other administrative &/or clerical activities such as organizing meetings; reserving AV equipment.
• Coordinates office, lab &/or building repairs & maintenance.
• Maintains inventory.

Training

• Assists with training of new staff members.
• Creates & provides financial training on practice, procedure, policy &/or laws & regulations to customers.

Supervision:

• Supervises or leads temporary, part-time or work study students.
• Provides guidance to junior employees.
• Performs other duties as assigned.
• This position will also occasionally cover front desk operations during vacations or when NUCASLL experiences high patient volume.

Minimum Qualifications:

• High school diploma or the equivalent.
• 3 years accounting &/or bookkeeping or other relevant experience.
• Excellent computer skills including proficiency in the use of spreadsheet, database and word processing software.
• Familiarity with financial reporting.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Bachelors degree with a focus on finance or accounting.
• Knowledge and skills around balance sheets, insurance processing, claims, and general finance management.
• Experience in both financial and revenue cycle operations within a healthcare industry is preferred.

As per Northwestern University policy, this position requires a criminal background check. Successful applicants will need to submit to a criminal background check prior to employment.

Northwestern University is an Equal Opportunity, Affirmative Action Employer of all protected classes, including veterans and individuals with disabilities. Women, racial and ethnic minorities, individuals with disabilities, and veterans are encouraged to apply. Hiring is contingent upon eligibility to work in the United States.