Under the supervision of the Director of Accounting or authorized designee, the Accounting Clerk processes cash disbursements from the Medical Centers and affiliate organizations, assuring timely payment of valid obligations. The Accounts Payable Clerk processes disbursement transactions consistent with established policies and procedures, mindful of the established approval and authorization requirements.
The Accounts Payable Clerk works with the other members of the Accounting staff to assure proper reporting of the Medical Center and affiliates' financial position and to help maintain the integrity of management reports.
The Accounts Payable Clerk works with the Materials Management and Hospital Information Systems departments to ensure system processes and interactions are operating properly.
System Specific Duties and Responsibilities:
- Open mail, alphabetize, scan, and/or file invoices and internal supporting documentation daily in a holding file, pending payment.
- Match invoices with purchase order receiving reports, assuring that goods and services being charged to the Medical Center or affiliate are legitimate and pricing, quantity and terms are consistent with the terms to which the Hospital previously agreed upon.
- Verify the math accuracy of invoices.
- Report discrepancies between purchase order price, quantity, and/or terms to the Materials Management department and work to determine the proper price, quantity, and/or terms.
- Code invoices and check request forms with vendor numbers, account numbers and voucher numbers for proper entry into the hospital computer system, as appropriate.
- Enter data by scanning or keying into the Medical Center computer systems to facilitate proper paying of obligations, generation of records and interface with the general ledger.
- Schedule payment of invoices to earn applicable discounts while retaining cash as long as possible.
- Upload payment files to affiliated systems/companies for payment.
- Review work queues related to all aspects of AP – pending approvals, unreleased, EDI, OCR and others.
- Schedule processing payroll liabilities and related taxes consistent with policy and legal requirements.
- Maintain monthly payment schedules for leases/rents/fixed payments/professional fees.
- Maintain list of approval codes.
- Assist non-Accounting staff in investigating and resolving vendor payment questions, account assignment questions, etc.
- Assist Accounting staff in researching disbursement questions encountered in the process of analyzing various transactions and account balances and preparing financial statements.
- Send price changes to Materials Management.
- Process patient refunds for payment.
- Interact with the Medical Center departments and affiliate personnel to obtain payment approval, receiving reports, and other supporting documentation in order to verify that the Medical Center or respective affiliate is in receipt of the invoiced goods and services and that payment should be processed.
- Interact with the Medical Center departments and affiliates to enforce compliance with policies and procedures relating to the disbursement of cash, such as the travel reimbursement policy.
- Participate in proper maintenance of the vendor files including, but not limited to, establishing vendor numbers in the Vendor Master File, updating address changes to provide complete and accurate records of parties receiving payments from the medical center, and securing appropriate documentation from vendors to assure proper tax reporting.
- Compute purchasers' use tax on invoices from vendors which do not collect state sales tax for remittance to the State of West Virginia in order to satisfy valid tax liabilities.
- Regularly review and execute the transactions required to maintain a true and accurate record of legitimate liabilities.
- Check the cash requirements report and choose invoices to be paid in the corresponding check run for disbursement authorization.
- Print and distribute checks, including sending files to banks and AP payment companies when applicable.
- Review payment data to prevent duplicate payment.
- Account for every check number, including properly documenting voided checks, to assure there are no stolen or misplaced checks and that adequate information is maintained for unclaimed property reporting.
- Maintains confidentiality.
- Performs other duties as required or assigned.
- Reports on the job as scheduled.
- Follows all standard safety precautions.
- Follows the standards of conduct and policies and procedures of St. Mary's Medical Center and applicable laws and regulations and reports violations through the appropriate chain of command.
- Annually completes required competency assessments.
- Utilize appropriate measures to promote and maintain patient safety.
- Demonstrates knowledge of operation to include but not limited to the required unit specific equipment/procedures.
- Demonstrates knowledge of on-going unit specific performance improvement activities.
Requirements:
Education:
High School graduate with courses in computers, typing, bookkeeping and filing.
Experience:
Previous experience in accounts payable and computer experience is required.
Physical demands are those physical activities required of a worker in a job. The worker must possess physical capabilities at least in an amount equal to the physical demands made by the job. Ability to perform simple manipulative skills such as writing, collating, and grasping objects; perform tasks that require eye-hand coordination such as operating computers and keyboarding skills; perform gross motor coordination such as reaching, turning, and moving about; be mobile and move from one place to another; hearing normal sounds with some background noise; hearing normal sounds with some background noise, perform moderately difficult manipulative skills; see objects closely.
