Clarification from the agency

This vacancy announcement is open to the public. This position allows for situational and recurring telework, but does not qualify for full-time or remote telework. The duty station is in the Thurgood Marshal Federal Judiciary Building at One Columbus Circle NE in Washington, DC, across the street from Union Station with easy access to Metro (red line), VRE, MARC, and Amtrak.

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (AO), Department of Administrative Services, Financial Management Office, Financial Operations Division (FOD), Payment Management Branch is seeking a self-motivated, experienced Accountant to join its team in the Disbursing & Reconciliation Section (DRS). This position reports to the DRS Chief.

FOD supports financial operations including accounting, finance, travel, disbursement, external financial and tax reporting, investment services, and other fiscal services to the AO and judiciary.

The Accountant must have excellent communication, interpersonal, organizational, and analytical skills. The ideal candidate must have experience with reconciling intragovernmental transactions, including payments, collections, and adjustments, and researching and coordinating the correction of transaction discrepancies.

The duties of the position include, but are not limited to:

1. Reviewing payment packages received via Payment Management Branch inbox for accuracy and completeness and process payments in the accounting system.
2. Coordinating with program offices to correct any errors encountered during document processing, including vendor or procurement inconsistencies.
3. Performing certifying officer duties and related tasks in the judiciary's accounting system, Treasury's Secure Payment System, and International Treasury Services.
4. Approving and reconciling intragovernmental transactions, including payments, collections, adjustments, and researching and coordinating the correction of transaction discrepancies.
5. Reviewing and coordinating international wire requests to ensure the appropriate tax withholdings and reporting requirements are applied and recorded.
6. Managing the reimbursement process for workers' compensation expenses under the Federal Employees' Compensation Act, including reconciling compensation data, contacting program offices for approvals, and coordinating the creation of the obligation and payment of reimbursement to the Office of Workers' Compensation Programs.
7. Managing the reimbursement process for unemployment benefits paid under Unemployment Compensation for Federal Employees, including reconciling compensation data, contacting program offices for approvals, coordinating the creation of the obligation and payment of the reimbursement to the Office of Unemployment Insurance.
8. Participating in post-payment activities, including the approvals of payment cancellations and replacement payments.
9. Leading the post payment review and analysis of judiciary disbursements and processes, including examining financial transactions, payments, and supporting documentation to ensure completeness, accuracy, and compliance with controls.
10. Coordinating with stakeholders to resolve disbursement discrepancies and imbalances with the Judiciary's Fund Balance with Treasury.
11. Monitoring judiciary-wide compliance with Internal Revenue Service tax statutes and regulations, including withholding requirements for domestic and foreign vendors, information return reporting (1099-C, 1099-INT, 1099-MISC, 1099-NEC, 1042, and 945), CP2100 notices, and tax identification numbers and certification requirements for domestic and foreign vendors and payees (W-8 and W-9).
12. Preparing and executing judiciary-wide information return reporting (i.e., 1099 and 1042), including transaction analysis, data verification, reconciliation, preparation and submission of the information returns, and required corrections.
13. Reviewing, analyzing, and reconciling payment and tax-related data, identifying discrepancies, and taking corrective actions.
14. Developing tax-related reports from the accounting system of record, Enterprise Data Warehouse, and other sources, and producing reports or data as requested by senior management.
15. Providing guidance to court units and federal public defender organizations on matters related to payments and post-payment activities, tax compliance and reporting, and questions and inquiries submitted through the Payment Management Branch helpdesk.
16. Acquiring and maintaining Contracting Officer Representative (COR) certification.
17. Assisting in acquisition planning, defining requirements, developing statements of work, and providing technical oversight of assigned contracts.
18. Managing relationships with different court units, federal public defender organizations, AO program offices, and external stakeholders.
19. Identifying, researching, and analyzing business process modernization, and providing actionable recommendations to management.

Conditions of employment

CONDITIONS OF EMPLOYMENT

1. All information is subject to verification. Applicants are advised that false answers or omissions of information on application materials or inability to meet the following conditions may be grounds for non-selection, withdrawal of an offer of employment, or dismissal after being employed.
2. Selection for this position is contingent upon completion of OF-306, Declaration of Federal Employment during the pre-employment process and proof of U.S. citizenship for competitive status positions or conversion to a competitive status position with the AO. If non-citizens are considered for hire into a temporary or any other position with non-competitive status or when it is confirmed by the AO Human Resources Office there are no qualified U.S. citizens for a competitive status position (unless prohibited by a law or statue), non-citizens must provide proof of authorization to work in the U.S. and proof of entitlement to receive compensation. Additional information on the employment of non-citizens can be found at USAJOBS Help Center | Employment of non-citizens/. For a list of documents that may be used to provide proof of citizenship or authorization to work in the United States, please refer to Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification.
3. All new AO employees will be required to complete an FBI fingerprint-based national criminal database and records check and pass a public trust suitability check.
4. New employees to the AO will be required to successfully pass the E-Verify employment verification check. To learn more about E-Verify, including your rights/responsibilities, visit https://www.e-verify.gov/.
5. All new AO employees are required to identify a financial institution for direct deposit of pay before appointment.
6. You will be required to serve a trial period if selected for a first-time appointment to the Federal government, transferring from another Federal agency, or serving as a first-time supervisor. Failure to successfully complete the trial period may result in termination of employment.
7. If appointed to a temporary position, management may have the discretion of converting the position to permanent depending upon funding and staffing allocation.

Qualifications

Applicants must have demonstrated experience as listed below. This requirement is according to the AO Classification, Compensation, and Recruitment Systems which include interpretive guidance and reference to the OPM Operating Manual for Qualification Standards for General Schedule Positions.

Specialized Experience: Applicants must have at least one year (52 weeks) of specialized experiencewhich is in or directly related to the line of work of this position. Specialized experience must demonstrate experience in ALL areas defined below:

• Applying generally accepted and federal accounting principles, standards, and practices to the full accounting cycle, including the preparation of work sheets, financial statements, ledgers, and journals.
• Analyzing general ledger account transactions and reconciling financial accounting systems.
• Assisting in preparing and analyzing payment and disbursement data between internal financial systems and U.S. Treasury systems.

How you will be evaluated

You will be evaluated for this job based on how well you meet the qualifications above.

We will review your resume and supporting documentation and compare this information to your responses on the occupational questionnaire to determine if you meet the minimum qualifications for this job. If you meet the minimum qualifications for this job, we will evaluate your application package, to assess the quality, depth, and complexity of your accomplishments, experience, and education as they relate to the requirements listed in this vacancy announcement.

You should be aware that your ratings are subject to evaluation and verification. If a determination is made that you have rated yourself higher than is supported by your resume and/or narrative responses, you will be assigned a rating commensurate to your described experience. Failure to submit the mandatory narrative responses will result in not receiving full consideration and/or rating credit. Deliberate attempts to falsify information may be grounds for not selecting you, withdrawing an offer of employment, or dismissal after being employed.