Crew member of a very exciting ship

My name is Juanita Schrader, about 8 months ago I became part of the accounts team of Mobile Transactions South Africa offices. I can safely say that I had no clue what I was getting myself into (I mean this in a good way LOL).

I am one of three finance administrators, the other two being Marissa Kruger and Charlton Meavers . We report to the Accountant Leshain Armstrong. In a nutshell, our duties consist of ensuring that all activities like send to banks, deposits, auto bank postings, etc are processed correctly to the banks and the system with the help of the customer care personnel Tasira Nkhata who works from the Zambia office. One of my responsibilities is to ensure that various accounts have adequate balances for these activities to happen. My other major responsibility is called the daily system and bank reconciliation. This is done daily and reconciles transactions on the banks and the system. If there are any discrepancies; then it is investigated. It is really a team effort. We work together, help each other to investigate and resolve queries and give feedback to customer care. Our work is very customer care orientated and at times can be very challenging as it would be in any other business. It is a difficult concept to grasp at times if you have not visited Zambia and seen the agents trading and doing business. When there are a challenges; we are in the spotlight and have all hands on deck to assist but when everything is smooth sailing then we give ourselves a pat on the back for a job well done.

We also provide services internally to other departments. E.g. purchase of bulk airtime, sending funds to work accounts, making payments as requested, assisting with analysis for month end processing on pastel.

This is not your ordinary 8-5 admin job. We have a very structured day and timelines for doing send to banks and checking deposits. We are involved in decision making and improving of procedure and processes which is great to know that you can make a contribution that can have an impact. It’s also pretty awesome; this is my first real job and I can truly say that these are the foundations of my career in finance. Just the other day, we imported and approved our first 1000^th automated Barclays’ batch and it felt fantastic to be part of such an achievement!

The IT Department and Accounting department are located in SA office. We recently moved into a bigger office which just goes to show we are growing .We are quite a young group of people which makes it an energetic and fun environment.

It is also a blessing to know that you have a job where you have a reason to wake up and say “oh yes I’m going to work” and not “oh work again”. So here’s to more growth personally and professionally as this ship continues on its journey to success!!

By Juanita Schrader

Finance administrator