Billing & Collections Manager

Billing and Collections Manager will join our Finance team in Dublin to lead our Billing and Collection Specialists that support Partners and Fee Earners in delivery of billing activities, a core element of our service-to-cash process and one which is critical for the business in hitting revenue and cash targets.

The role will have line management responsibility for the Billing and Collections team and will report to the Regional Working Capital Manager functionally and will have a dotted line to the Head of Finance Ireland.

The Billing function is responsible for managing the billing cycle, managing the matters and associated financial hygiene factors. The Credit Control Function is tasked with optimising the cash collection cycle.

This is a demanding role within an ever-changing environment. It is operational in nature with the individual’s performance having a direct impact on the Firm’s bottom line and as such, the role will be largely target driven.

As a Billing and Collections Manager, you will be involved in ensuring the delivery of billing and collections activities as well as being an escalation point of contact for Partners and Fee Earners and/or Billing and Collection Coordinators to address billing issues. You will also act as the bridge between the Regional Working Capital Manager and the Partners as part of managing local billing and collections performance.

You will lead on the quality of the billing and collection process (including streamlining and optimisation), at times working with Partners and client expectations to drive the implementation of internal policies which allow us to manage risk while maintaining a strong focus on billing targets. The role will also collaborate with our Legal Administration stakeholders who are in a critical, client facing and Partner support position.

Overall, you will have a significant impact on the success of our Service-to-Cash process and manage the local Billing team Senior Creditor Controller in their delivery of billing and collections activities.

Main duties and responsibilities

You will be responsible for Managing the Billing / Collections Team:

• Managing the performance of the billing and collections team, overseeing workloads, maintaining team structure, supporting development of team members, and ensuring alignment between team members and Partners.
• Coaching team members on achieving billing and WIP (Work in Progress) key performance indicators (KPIs), providing areas of concern report to the billers to focus on at monthly billing/WIP meetings and leading on performance management in these areas.
• Lead the onboarding and training of new Billing Coordinators and review updates to the relevant training materials as required.
• Lead and oversee a team of Billing Coordinators, ensuring timely, accurate, and compliant WIP and Billing cycles by providing coaching support, implementing training to identify ways to shorten WIP to Cash cycle and balancing workloads during peaks and troughs of billing cycles.
• Continue to improve the Lockup Day profile, through internal and external benchmarking
• Deliver the monthly billing and cash collection targets in conjunction with the working capital team.
• Agree targets and supporting initiatives and operational metrics and KPI’s.

You will act as a key Business Partner between the Team and Partners/Fee-Earners:

• Serve as an escalation point of contact for Partners, gaining a thorough understanding of business drivers and the impact of billing and collections on financial performance.
• Collaborate with Legal Administration teams to provide cohesive support to Partners and their clients; ad-hoc tasks, client reporting, etc.
• Assist the Regional Working Capital Manager, Head of Finance and Fee Earners/Partners with ad-hoc tasks.
• Understand the business, and in time implement a process that billers can execute on to help Location Heads/HOF establish, and subsequently monitor, regular billing patterns to provide more accurate forecasting and resolve any group issues.
• Monitor existing fee arrangements and provide commercial and practical advice on fee agreements.

You will lead on Fulfilment and Optimisation of Billing activities:

• Provide oversight in matter review performance with Billing Coordinators and drive the implementation of necessary actions to meet KPIs. Provide quality assurance of any master data or charge out rate activity taking place in the billing team.
• Review WIP, Billing performance Collections with Partner groups and identify levers to improve performance.
• Act as a key contact for Billing and Collections for escalating ad-hoc complex requests (e-bills, multi-payor matters, etc) by engaging with senior stakeholders across Global Services Center and other DLA Piper offices.
• Coordinate the handling of complex billing issues/queries, both technical and non-technical, from Billing Specialists and Clients by raising and escalating the queries to the right stakeholders.
• Identify ways of improvement and optimise the local billing process alongside Head of Finance and Global Process Owners/Leads and Head of Operations.
• Drive local implementation of process improvements to meet office KPIs, including the creation of standard/ad-hoc reports and dashboards. Collaborate with Billing Coordinators, Collections, Other finance colleagues, Fee Earners, and Partners to achieve these improvements.
• Escalate key issues to the Local HOF and Regional Working Capital Manager when necessary.

You will also lead on Lockup:

• Work closely with Collectors and support in implementing actions for unpaid invoices and aged receivables.
• Ensure compliance with firm's standards and guidelines.
• Provide analysis and reporting on the WIP (Time and Costs ) cull to identify inefficient billing practices and drive implementation of ways of improvement.

About you

• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills to collaborate with Partners, Finance colleagues, and other stakeholders to drive performance improvement.
• In-depth knowledge of billing processes, including timely and accurate billing cycles, credit control, and resolving billing issues.
• Experience in analysing financial data and generating reports and dashboards, implementing improvement action plans.
• Excellent organisational and time management skills to prioritize tasks and meet deadlines.
• Strong leadership, management and people management skills to effectively manage and guide a team of Billing Coordinators with previous experience (optional not required) in managing a team and driving performance improvement.
• Strong knowledge of local VAT standards and guidelines, with prior experience in leading on accuracy and compliance in billing activities.
• Experienced in handling financial systems and software used for billing and invoicing, such as SAP S/4HANA, Concur, Service Now, E-Billing Platforms and MS Office Suite.
• 5+ years of experience in billing or finance roles, preferably in a professional services or legal environment.
• Professional Accounting Qualification desirable.
• Proficient in English.