Accounting Officer

Accounting Officer

Department: Department of Veterans Affairs

Location(s): Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania

Salary Range: $89508 - $116362 Per Year

Job Summary: As the senior professional accountant at the Wilkes-Barre, VA Medical Center, the employee is responsible for the administration and application of VA generally accepted standards and principles. The employee is further responsible for the ongoing maintenance of a highly complex set of cost accounting records (Cost Distribution Report) at the Medical Center.

Major Duties:

• The position involves training of accounting department personnel in the proper application of both general and cost accounting standards, developing and conducting internal control and compliance audits to ensure compliance with laws, statutes, etc., appropriate use of VA purchase cards, regulations, processes and/or procedures. Duties include but are not limited to: Research, plans, directs and controls all aspects of the accounting process, including general ledger, FMS (Financial Management System) records, cost, purchase card, allotment, receivables and expense and asset sub-ledgers. Ensures that cost accounting entries are properly reflected in the General Ledger and that costs are recorded and segregated into appropriate services lines, i.e. CDR Accounts. Monitors facility funding and ensures that cost ceilings are established timely and fund control points are not exceeding funding availability. Ensures that training is provided to all fund control point users and officials needed to ensure that responsible system users are properlytrained and understand the responsibilities and accountability for funds assigned to their respective fund control points. Serves as Acting Chief, Finance Service in the absence of the incumbent. Plans, organizes and implements reconciliations of all facility sub-Ledger reports to the station trial balance. Develops and performs fund control point audits to ensure appropriateness, efficiency and timeliness of charges. Serves as a senior advisor to the Chief, Finance Service and/or other members of senior management in all matters relevant to financial integrity, knowledge-and interpretation of laws, regulations, statutes and legal opinions. Assists the Chief: Finance Service in analysis of operations and its effect upon the financial condition of the facility. Work Schedule: Monday-Friday 7:00 a.m.- 3:30 p.m. Telework: This position may be authorized for telework. Telework eligibility will be discussed during the interview process. Virtual: This is not a virtual position. Position Description/PD#: Accounting Officer/PD043870 Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not authorized Critical Skills Incentive (CSI): Not authorized Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not authorized

Qualifications: To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 03/13/2026. Time-In-Grade Requirement: Applicants who are current Federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements by the closing date of this announcement. For a GS-12 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-11. The grade may have been in any occupation, but must have been held in the Federal service. An SF-50 that shows your time-in-grade eligibility must be submitted with your application materials. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must provide an additional SF-50 that clearly demonstrates one-year time-in-grade. Note: Time-In-Grade requirements also apply to former Federal employees applying for reinstatement as well as current employees applying for Veterans Employment Opportunities Act of 1998 (VEOA) appointment. You may qualify based on your experience and/or education as described below: Specialized Experience: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade GS-11 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to: 1) Provides management with a basis for financial planning. 2) Provides guidance and assistance to lower graded accountants, accounting interns and technicians. 3) Performs the full range of professional accounting work. 4) Gathers and analyzes data from a variety of sources. 5) Manages the detailed and efficient operation and control of day-to-day fiscal activities. AND, Education: Applicant must possess a degree in Accounting; or a degree in a related field such as business administration, finance, or public administration that included or was supplemented by 24 semester hours in accounting. OR, Combination: Applicant must possess at least 4 years of experience in accounting, or an equivalent combination of accounting experience, college-level education, and training that provided professional accounting knowledge. This must also include: Twenty-four semester hours in accounting or auditing courses, A certificate as Certified Public Accountant or a Certified Internal Auditor (obtained through written examination) OR Completion of the requirements for a degree that included substantial course work in accounting or auditing and have worked at the full-performance level in accounting, auditing, or a related field. You will be rated on the following Competencies for this position: Accounting Communication Principles of Accounting Technology Application Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religions; spiritual; community; student; social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. Note: A full year of work is considered to be 35-40 hours of work per week. Part-time experience will be credited on the basis of time actually spent in appropriate activities. Applicants wishing to receive credit for such experience must indicate clearly the nature of their duties and responsibilities in each position and the number of hours a week spent in such employment. Physical Requirements: Work is mostly sedentary, although there may be some nominal walking or standing for short periods of time. The work involves coping with complex, persistent demands from a variety of sources that can be regarded as a high-pressure work situation. Good eyesight and hand dexterity is necessary to allow for reading from CRT, and accessing information from the various computer systems. Good hearing and speech abilities are necessary in order to handle the extensive telephone contacts. Work sometimes requires long hours to meet project deadlines and to devise corrective action for unexpected technical crises. For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

How to Apply: All applicants are encouraged to apply online. To apply for this position, you must complete the questionnaire and submit the documentation specified in the Required Documents section below. The complete application package must be submitted by 11:59 PM (ET) on 03/13/2026 to receive consideration. To preview the questionnaire click https://apply.usastaffing.gov/ViewQuestionnaire/12906542. To begin, click Apply Online to create a USA JOBS account or log in to your existing account. Follow the prompts to select your USA JOBS resume and/or other supporting documents and complete the occupational questionnaire. Click Submit My Answers to submit your application package. NOTE: It is your responsibility to ensure your responses and appropriate documentation is submitted prior to the closing date. Beginning September 27, 2025, Federal agencies will only accept resumes up to two pages in length to comply with the Merit Hiring Plan. Resumes longer than two pages will result in ineligibility for further consideration for the position. USAJOBS will not allow you to upload or build resumes longer than two pages, and you will need to update the resumes in your profile before applying for a job. Resumes should include information relevant to the knowledge, skills, abilities, and competencies of the position to which you are applying. VA is unable to make assumptions about qualifications if not clearly listed. Resumes must be legible so they can be reviewed for eligibility, minimum qualifications and other position requirements listed in the job announcement. Your resume must be 5MB or less. We recommend saving and uploading your resume as a PDF to maintain formatting and number of pages. We also accept GIF, JPG, JPEG, PNG, RTF, TXT, PDF, ODT or Word (DOC or DOCX). We do not accept PDF portfolio files. We recommend using a sans-serif font size like Lato, if available. Other widely available options are Calibri, Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, Open San Source Sans Pro, Roboto or Noro Sans. Make your page margins 0.5 inches. Consider using 14-point size font for titles and 10-point for the main text in your resume. The resume builder can help you create a resume using these recommendations and uses the information in your USAJOBS profile to help you get started. Helpful Hints for Creating a Two-Page Resume: Prioritize most relevant and recent experience Use concise, results focused language Align language from the job announcement Focus on demonstrating skills and competencies Remove outdated or unrelated experience Use the USAJOBS resume builder Additional guidance on this new requirement and resume building tools can be found at: https://help.usajobs.gov/faq/application/documents/resume/page-limit https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/hiring-information/merit-hiring-plan-resources/applicant-guidance-on-the-two-page-resume-limit/ During the application process you may have an option to opt-in to make your resume available to hiring managers in the agency who have similar positions. Opting in does not impact your application for this announcement, nor does it guarantee further consideration for additional positions.

Application Deadline: 2026-03-13