Job Vacancies at Astron Energy (Pty) Ltd.

Responsibilities for this position may include but are not limited to:

Bank and Cash activities (South Africa and Botswana entities)

• Responsible for coordinating daily processing of foreign and once-off (manual) payments. This includes the set up and coordination of daily releasing of manual payments, processing of payments and clearing of bank suspense accounts
• Administer online bank application platforms, e.g. add and remove payment beneficiaries, manage user access and permissions to FNB Online
• Manage the end-to-end process of confirming daily inward foreign payments as per bank notification
• Check that daily bank statement uploaded successfully into ERP system (complete and accurate)
• Prepare Bank and cash account reconciliations

Month-end and year–end financial close activities

• Align bank account balances in ERP with Bank statement and perform cut-off validation steps
• Manually load bank statements for bank accounts not automated
• Record and validate month end close transactions
• Perform re-classifications, clearing of FX switch accounts
• Prepare month end bank and cash reports

General administrative activities

• Responsible for bank governance, i.e. maintain banking related documentation and manage queries, e.g. KYC, FICA, Bank Mandates, Credit reviews, NDAs etc.
• Update/maintain banking detail confirmations as and when requested by 3rd parties (e.g. audit confirmation letters)
• Perform 3rd party bank account verifications for vendors and customers
• Accountable for internal and external audit deliverables related to Cash and Bank processes
• Provide Treasury support on projects
• Seek opportunities to improve and optimize Treasury processes

Required Qualifications and Experience:

• Commerce/Finance related degree or diploma
• Basic accounting knowledge
• Working knowledge of electronic banking systems and ERP systems (e.g. SAP) are preferable
• Strong capability for research and interpretation of a technical nature
• Excel working knowledge
• Good communication and influencing skills
• Ability to effectively interact with diverse stakeholders (e.g. customers, banks and internal stakeholders)
• Attention to detail, meeting deadlines
• Ability to work in an organized manner is critical qualities required for the role

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• Reporting to the Reliability and Maintenance Manager, Manages >20 staff and large maintenance service contracts, providing work direction and team coordination of the Maintenance Engineering team, Mechanical Workshops, Mechanical Equipment repair groups to successfully execute routine maintenance activities at the Cape Town refinery to optimize plant reliability and availability and safe plant operation.

Purpose of Job / Role Intent:

• Interfaces with other Refinery departments, local head office and corporate to implement operational and facility improvement initiatives, promoting teamwork and collaboration at all times. As project member is actively involved with Procurement in the identification, sourcing and procurement of outsourced services. Understands and applies the OEMS requirements as they pertain to this position.
• Manages work direction and team coordination of the Mechanical Workshops, Mechanical Equipment repair groups to successfully execute routine maintenance activities (at the Cape Town refinery) to optimize plant reliability and availability and safe plant operation.
• Manages and maintains general contractor services and supply agreements in terms of resources and facilities outsourcing to maximize benefits and returns to the Refinery. Allocates resources to support efforts to continuously improve plant reliability through monitoring, failure investigation and corporate Best Practice reliability maintenance programmes.
• Executes Loss Prevention System (LPS) Manager Stewardship functions by formally reviewing LPS activities and ensuring execution of the process. Provides coaching to reports and contractors to sustain excellent LPS performance. Fosters and promotes Incident & Injury Free (IIF) behaviors within the workgroup.
• Accountable for the compilation and control of the annual budget related to this position.
• Effectively utilizes company and contract manpower, materials and other resources to meet refinery strategic plans Interface with other departments to implement operational and facility improvement initiatives promoting teamwork and collaboration at all times.
• Develop staff using appropriate Astron HR processes and tools. Provide periodic feedback on individual and workgroup achievements.  Sets expectations and targets for individual reports via Performance Management Process to support and enable continuous improvement in order to achieve and sustain 1st quartile corporate refining performance. Ensures that corporate compliance requirements are met.

As Control Executor,

• Owns individual Critical Controls types
• As Control Executor, is accountable for
• Execution of a specific tasks related to Critical Controls
• Reviewing and signing-off on Critical Controls quarterly report data accuracy
• Verifies Critical Controls effectiveness on sample basis

It is preferred that the incumbent of this role holds an appropriate  appointment in terms of the Occupational Health and Safety Act No 85 of 1993 (‘OHSA”), in terms of which you will  assist your Departmental Manager / Head in the execution of the duties and responsibilities, as contemplated in section 8 of the OHSA

Qualifications:

• B.Sc / B. Eng Mechanical Engineering
• Government Certificate of Compliance (GCC) Preferred
• Pr. Eng Preferred

Work Experience:

• Refining /petro-chemical or heaving industrial experience preferred
• 10 years experience in mechanical engineering / maintenance inclusive of demonstrated leadership experience

Knowledge and skills:

• Technically knowledgeable
• Knowledge of ASTM, ASME and API technical codes.
• Able to read and understand system maps and process P&ID’s.
• Working knowledge of SAP
• Proficient with MS Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
• Good presentation, communication, and written skills
• Preferance that the incumbent holds GCC Factories to be appointed as GMR 2(1)

Application deadline:

09 March 2023

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Managing a team of 7 credit analysts to provide effective credit management services to control the credit exposure relating to Trade and Other than Trade Receivables.

Financial Perspective

• Oversees the preparation of monthly credit performance metrics and reports with commentary presented at the Credit Board meeting
• Daily review and resolution of blocked sales orders
• Effective monitoring of customer payments and resolution of any past dues

Customer Perspective

• Continually strives for process efficiencies and innovative credit solutions to better service the business units and external customers.  Strives to reduce costs to deliver credit services.
• Responsible for evaluating credit risk, determining credit lines and security requirements.  Personally review and approve credit decisions for accounts over direct reports’ Delegation of Authority as well as dealing with complex and high-level credit related matters
• Drives full utilization of the Bectran Credit Management system within the organization
• Conducts customer visits as and when needed
• Evaluates the South African economic and political climate enabling timely credit risk management

Internal Processes

• Ensures a strong internal control environment is maintained in line with agreed control procedures
• Ensures a strong business contingency plan is in place and has been tested for the department. 

People Management

• Provides work direction to 7 direct reports, plus transitional staff. Completes Performance Management Process, salary administration, and career development for team members. 
• Drives credit policies, initiatives, and best practices throughout the various business channels.  Ensures proper delegation of authority is administered to enable timely and effective credit decision making. 

Leadership

• Key team member of Finance Leadership Team
• Active participant in customer deal approval forums

Qualification and Experience for this role:

• CA(SA) or Post Graduate qualification in Credit Risk Management
• Prior experience within a credit management function and exposure to managing a team is highly preferred.
• Excellent analytic ability to understand and anticipate credit risks
• Strong communication skills and ability to effectively engage with customers and internal stakeholders (incl. senior management) on varying levels of business, financial and credit related complexities
• Strong financial acumen - comfortable working with and assessing customer Financials i.e. Income statement, Balance Sheet, cash Flow Statement, Forecasted Projections.
• Fully conversant with IFRS standards and other regulatory standards relating to Credits functions.
• Ability to work under pressure, working to tight deadlines and independently manage a number of different tasks, as well as be able to switch priorities at short notice.
• Able to work independently and deliver creative innovative solutions to mitigate credit risk.
• Demonstrate a firm grasp of the key commercial considerations, as well as an ability to weigh up customer value propositions and make recommendations as appropriate.

Application deadline:

02 March 2023

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Astron Energy are seeking a HR Operations Manager.

• It is a strategic imperative to further move the HR Function from an administrative/consultative function to be a trusted Business Partner in order to deliver business value, whilst providing efficient & effective HR Advisory support. The role of the HR Operations Manager will lead the HR transactional services through a strategy of automation and employee self-service, with improved administrative excellence - better, faster, simpler people processes.

Key accountabilities:

• Act as the subject matter expert and resolve any escalated issues on Employee Self Service/Manager Self Service
• Collaborate with HR partners and Centres of Expertise (COE’s) to communicate and/or present new processes or gather and incorporate feedback
• Seek out opportunities to automate and enhance our operations to be more efficient, while keeping employee experience as the utmost priority.
• Utilize human resource information systems (HRIS) (Workday) in the most efficient and effective way to improve HR delivery
• Preparing, analysing and completing any HR insights for business decisions on Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly and Annually as required
• Managing the end-to-end onboarding/ offboarding processes ensure compliance and overall employee experience
• Developing and implementing improvement plans to HR processes and policies
• Managing and monitoring and reporting on the HR Opex in line with business requirements
• End to end payroll management

Qualifications and Experience:

• Experience with the key responsibilities defined above with 5+ years in human resource
• Bachelor’s degree in human resource management, business administration or a related field
• Proficiency with MS Office applications especially Excel (advanced level), PowerPoint, and Outlook
• Experience leading the execution of human resource initiatives
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Ability to effectively work with employees at all levels of the organization
• Excellent administrative and organisational skills
• Experience handling sensitive matters with tact and diplomacy
• Ability to create and maintain relationships with business partners
• High energy with the ability to energize others
• Ability to autonomously attack problems while driving solutions collaboratively in a team environment
• Enjoys a challenge and is committed to leading a team in a high-performance organization
• Experience with Workday (Expert level)
• Experience in data analytics and systems (Expert level)

Ensure the highest standards of Continuous and Operational Excellence, driving out complexity in our processes and practices and establishing a culture of continuous improvement within our people.

Application deadline:

07 March 2023

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• Reporting to Drawing Office Lead, in Technical Services, this role is responsible for the accuracy and integrity of Control & Instrumentation drawings and the Astron Smart Plant Instrumention (SPI) database - an Electronic Computer Aided Design (CAD) software . Supports Reliability & Maintenance (R&M), Project Managers, Process & Instrumentation Diagram (P&ID) draftsman, Control & Instrumentation (C&I) engineers, Analyzer and Safety Instrumentation System engineers. Interface with Engineering Contractors (EC/EPC/EPCM) design teams to ensure design and deliverables meet Industry / Astron specification and standards.

Professional Qualification and Certifications: 

• B-Tech / NDip - Electrical (Light Current) or similar Engineering
• Industry/Software Certification in Intergraph Smart Instrumentation software, or formerly known as either SmartPlant Instrumentation (SPI) or INtools - strongly preferred

Work Experience:

• 2 to 5 years’ experience working as Smart Plant Instrumentation (SPI) Administrator or User with deep software knowledge & experience preferably in a petro-chemical refinery (Job Band 7B, 7A or 6 could apply, depending on the level of experience/software certification & qualifications)
• P&ID instrumentation symbology and tag numbering conventions
• Experience in Instrumentation drawing formats, equipment identification and numbering systems.
• Experience in system administration, tracking tools, installation of systems and User support
• System maintenance and upgrades

Knowledge and skills:

• Knowledge of Instrumentation technology, Refinery plant and processes
• Ability to build strong customer-focused relationships amongst the various Business Units.
• Manages own time to ensure efficient and productive work output.
• Keep pace with Technology advancement of Instrumentation Designs and Drafting products and software tools.
• Strong planning, prioritization and time-management skills - Able to manage high volume of workload with competing priorities and deadlines
• Strong work ethic and commitment to deliver results the right way yet with a sense of urgency and accuracy
• Able to function individually and as a Team Member with minimal supervision
• Ability to read and understand lnstrumentation drawings, including symbols as used in various standards.
• Fluency in English is essential.
• Good communication, organizational and administration skills.
• Strong software proficiency in SPI/SPF, AutoCAD, MS Office (Word, Excel, and Power Point).
• Able to work in a high volume and a fast paced environment.
• Good knowledge of the American Petroleum Institute (API), South African National Standard (SANS) and other Codes and Standards related to Petrochemical Plants.

OPEX & CAPEX optimisation by completing competent designs / drawings on time and to the right quality standards, having engaged the right SME’s and having validated assumptions through field verifications and standards checking. 

OPEX & CAPEX optimisation by ensuring drafting work produced, including externally produced EPCm drawings have been checked for correctness and Standards prior to submittal for AFC approval.

Controls & Instrumentation (C&I) Design and drafting function –

• perform design & drafting  for small projects or changes performed by R&M.
• Ensure any changes or replacements by R&M are captured in SPI datasheets.

Technically responsible for quality and designs of all drafting work produced, including externally produced EPCm drawings. Include checking of drawings for correctness and Standards prior to submittal for AFC approval.

Project Archiving:  Perform project archiving.

System Control:  Control the issuing of new instrument and equipment tag numbers to EC/EPC/EPCM to ensure the consistency and integrity of our equipment identification and numbering systems.

Data Base Management:  Control access to our SPI system by EC/EPC/EPCM to ensure that the integrity of our SPI database is maintained.  Control the issueing of seed files to EC/EPC/EPCM to ensure consistent instrumentation drawing formats are used.  Perform day to day maintenance on the SPI system and perform annual SPI upgrades.

Tracking of instrumentation as-building status and report on EC/EPC/EPCM failure to as-build all drawings and documents.

Control the issuing of DCS/SIS capacity to EC/EPC/EPCM to prevent clashes between concurrent projects.  Ensure consistent instrumentation drawing formats are used.  Ensure consistent naming, P&ID instrumentation symbology and tag numbering conventions are used by EC/EPC/EPCM and compliance with ISA standards.

User Support:  Train new users from R&M or TSD on the use of the SPI system. Install SPI on the system of new users.  User support & coaching.

Development Plan in place and feedback received and acted upon. Participate in Training & development opportunities.  Continuous improvement methodology adopted, learning  new skills and technology on an ongoing basis. 

Sharing learnings with team members and demonstrate transparency about lessons learnt.

Application deadline:

02 March 2023

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Contract End Date - 02/03/2023

The purpose of the Retail Automation and Card Coordinator’s role is to be the single point of control for re-branding all Namos and Flexilane systems, documentation and will co-ordinate the end-to-end process from planning what system changes are necessary based on the information from site surveys, identifying what agreements need to be re-signed and co-ordinate vendors to do the physical changes on site at the same time as when new signage are installed.

• Review all Retail and Card check sheets developed from site surveys and revert/confirm any changes or accuracy
• Use the site list and information from site surveys to determine which contract addendums are needed for amendments for resigning within the current Retail Automation and Card agreements
• Coordinate the necessary changes in the addendums and communicate via the DIT and BM Site Coordinators to the retailer that addendums will be send to them for signature
• Ensure the DIT / BM Coordinators shared with retailers for signature and process through AE BAU
• Update POS & Card activities on Smartsheet per site during the full life cycle of the de-branding and re-branding implementation
• For DIT / BM Sites that are (Namos/BCX/NetPos/SmartFuel supported) , arrange with Retailers/ POS & Card vendors to deploy new rebrand standard
• For BM and Landlord owned sites, instruct BMs and Landlords to engage with POS and Card payment vendors to ensure that Caltex brand identities on systems are replaced with new Brand Identity

Ensure the new site name changes are completed in AE Connect, TRACS and SAP and that all stakeholders are informed

Liaise with Card Ops Team to engage Flexilane site changes (load sheet)

• Change of products
• UCount changes

Replacement of legacy local account cards (Calcards)

• Track Card brand changes
• Liaise with Internal stakeholders on the system changes related to Starcard - TRACs and SAP
• Coordination with project and brand team of the new marketing material – including the replacement plastics
• Liaise with C&I Team for validating any debranding data points.
• Attend weekly Ikhwezi Meetings and provide a status update the Rebrand Sequence progress, highlight potential risks and issues.

Relationships

• This role will report directly to the Retail Sites Lead. This role will also co-operate closely with the DIT and BM Site Co-Ordinators, Branded Marketers, AE Territory Manager / Business Consultants, Uphondo Regional Project Manager and Uphondo Planner.

Skills

• Good communication skills
• IT background and very good understanding of Astron Energy POS and Card payment systems
• MS Excel proficiency
• MS Outlook proficiency
• Ability to learn how to use Smartsheets (cloud-based programming tool) as planning, monitoring and control tool

Experience

• Past working experience with Namos and Flexilane and other systems.

Qualifications

• IT / PM related Diploma or Degree

Performance Criteria

• Number of sites successfully re-branded per month (target 25 to 27 sites per month)