How to become a finance officer
Official title: Finance officers
Also called: Finance officer, Recovery officer, Financial officer, Deputy finance officer, School finance officer, Regional finance officer
Finance officers oversee book-keeping, general accounting and other financial and related clerical functions mainly within local government and a variety of public sector organisations.
Main tasks
- Oversees the recording and checking of daily financial transactions, the preparation of provisional balances and reconciliation of accounts
- Prepares or arranges the preparation of financial reports for managers
- Plans work schedules and assigns tasks to financial clerks
- Coordinates the activities and resources of finance departments
How to become one
Entrants will normally possess GCSEs/S grades (including maths), a finance-related qualification at an appropriate level and have relevant work experience.
Ways in
- University: Arts & Humanities degrees, Offered by 27 universities in the UK
- University: Business & Commerce degrees, Offered by 27 universities in the UK
Pay · Outlook
- Median full-time pay: £31,943 a year The middle half earn £28,090 to £37,018.
- About 52,900 people work in this job now, and about 50,300 are projected by 2035. (-5%)
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Questions people ask
How do I become a finance officer?
Entrants will normally possess GCSEs/S grades (including maths), a finance-related qualification at an appropriate level and have relevant work experience.
How much does a finance officer earn in the UK?
Median full-time pay is £31,943 a year (Office for National Statistics). The middle half earn £28,090 to £37,018.
Is a finance officer a growing career in the UK?
Employment is projected to fall 5% by 2035, from about 52,900 to about 50,300 people (Department for Education).
Do you need a degree to become a finance officer?
Not always. 49% of people in this job hold a bachelor's degree or higher. Ways in include: Arts & Humanities degrees; Business & Commerce degrees.
Sources
- Office for National Statistics: Annual Population Survey: employment by occupation (April 2025 to March 2026), OGL v3.0, retrieved 2026-10-03
- Office for National Statistics: SOC 2020 Volume 1: structure and descriptions (2026-08-27 edition), OGL v3.0, retrieved 2026-10-03
- Department for Education: Skills Imperative 2035: employment projections by occupation (2021 to 2035 (Warwick IER / Cambridge Econometrics)), OGL v3.0, retrieved 2026-10-03
- Office for National Statistics: Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, Table 14 (2025 provisional), OGL v3.0, retrieved 2026-10-03
Updated 2026-10-03
Graduate outcomes: Discover Uni dataset, HESA (www.hesa.ac.uk), licensed under CC BY 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0). Aggregated by subject and adapted by Peernovo.