Regional Section Head - Tax, Legal and Procurement

Job Purpose

The role is responsible for effectively managing the vetting, execution and renewal of agreements and contracts at the regional / plant level, thereby mitigating risks. The role holder is expected to engage with tax authorities, resolve any queries, notices and/or appear before them. He / She is also responsible for monitoring of legal and regulatory compliance regarding all financial functions, ensuring quarterly balance confirmation from vendors is done so there is no reconciliation or quantity dispute and following-up for invoices and invoice processing for UBS suppliers.

Job Context & Major Challenges

UltraTech Cement has grown exceptionally in terms of capacity additions in the last few years and has outpaced other companies in this aspect. veConsidering the aggressive pace at which the company is growing, constantly relooking at and reviewing systems and processes of the organization and staying connected with business realities and market dynamics is critical. In this given context, the role of the One Commercial function is pivotal in maintaining current business continuity, while preparing and implementing processes for future.

As a Business Driver/Integrator/Partner

In addition to Grey cement, the One Commercial team continues to cater to the demands and requirements of other growing business units including RMC,Key Accounts,UBS and BPD, enabling them and helping them drive business outcomes. Partnering with diverse stakeholders from each of these businesses, ensuring smooth day to day operations, de-bottlenecking, and driving quick decision making is a key expectation from this function.

Not only does this demand in-depth understanding of the nuances of each business, their context, challenges and requirements, organization goals and management expectations, but also requires keeping abreast of practices and initiatives of the cement industry and other relevant industries, up to date clear understanding of government laws and policies in the fields of commercial, taxation and legal contracting areas.

As a Performance Enabler, This role is extremely critical as it is expected to plan, strategize and execute to meet the expectations of the Management and in particular requirements of its key stakeholder, the Marketing function. Considering the need for business scale up at multiple locations due to the business’s fast paced growth and expansion, the One Commercial team supports and enables the business to perform with speed and achieve its business goals, considering the dynamic business environment, the feasibility, risks and returns.

Specifically, this role/team is required to focus extensively on profitability analysis, optimum utilization of resources, option management, NCR analysis, monitoring of outstanding and highlighting insights to the Management at appropriate levels to facilitate sound decision making.

As a Risk Mitigator

The nature of risk along with risk dimensions is ever increasing. Therefore, a key responsibility of the One Commercial function necessary includes on-going tracking of operations and plans to ensure thorough legal compliance and adherence to company policies and processes.

A critical role of the Commercial function is liaising with external agencies including but not limited to regulatory and tax authorities, vendors, suppliers and customers. In this context, the function plays the role of a risk mitigator, ensuring that day to day business is transacted at optimum cost as usual, while also protecting the interests of the organization and arriving at a win-win situation.

As a Solution Provider

The role requires high cross-functional domain knowledge. The Commercial function plays the role of a trusted partner to all functions such as Marketing, Logistics, Technical Services, RMC,Key Accounts, UBS, BPD, etc., providing them with key inputs to possible alternatives. Stakeholder management is critical for the role holder considering the nature of tasks he/she is expected to perform.

Providing analysis of proposals including approvals for exceptions, operational plans etc. from stakeholders/management demands strong convincing and persuasion skills. The role holder is expected to partner with cross-functional teams and stakeholders to drive / support the execution of plans and interventions, while also ensuring smooth continuity of business with minimum disruptions. In this context, the role also doubles up as a key solution provider and problem solver, helping teams on the ground overcome challenges on a day to day basis and continue delivering outcomes.

Key Result Areas

• Contributes to and is responsible for the issue of purchase orders, regular review of performance of UBS outlets and negotiations with suppliers
• Follow-up for invoices and invoice processing for UBS suppliers
• Issue of Purchase Order for all UBS Purchases
• Prepare working for credit notes, Turnover discount (TOD), CD and ensure all these discounts are received from vendors
• Quarterly balance confirmation from vendors so there is no reconciliation or quantity dispute

• Contributes to and is responsible for the preparation / review / renewal of agreements & contracts in a timely fashion to protect the company’s interests and mitigate risks to the best extent possible
• Completion & secured maintenance of all required agreements at regional / plant level
• Appropriately vet / review all zonal /regional level contracts, orders and documents to ensure all salient terms and conditions as agreed are duly and properly incorporated
• Renewal of agreements or contracts before expiry at Region
• Contributes to and is responsible for engaging with tax authorities and also ensuring necessary legal vetting of responses to show cause notices / GST notices and letters
• Timely responses on all GST related queries of internal & external customers to ensure adherence to GST regulations across organization
• To provide timely responses to all the show cause notices / letters issued by GST departments, by ensuring necessary legal vetting & approval from the corporate team
• Appear before the Central Excise / Service Tax / VAT / GST authority for personal hearing and convince the authorities for favorable decision
• Ensure Central Excise audit of RMC plants conducted by the department is handled efficiently and all input and output records are provided to the satisfaction of department so as to ensure SCN is not issued by department
• Ensure the Service Tax audit of RMC / Cement conducted by the department is handled efficiently and all input and output records are provided to the satisfaction of department so as to ensure SCN is not issued by department
• Contributes and is responsible to attend and monitor court hearings for all legal cases and ensure filing of insolvency proceedings at NCLT for recovery of due amounts from corporate entities
• Issue notice through advocate within 15 days of any cheque bouncing and maintain proper records for filing of legal case under section 138 for cheque bouncing
• Collation of proper documents and evidences in case of cheque bouncing / summary suit cases under section 138 and present them appropriately at all the hearing
• Attend Court hearings for all legal cases
• Track and continuously monitor progress in matter of review contingent liability; monitor legal and regulatory compliance regarding all financial functions
• To ensure the summons issued by the court are served to the concerned party, through the support of police department, so that the case is pursued effectively

Contributes to and is responsible for identifying training needs and ensuring growth and capability development for own team members

Identify training needs for the workforce and ensure the implementation of the necessary trainings

Create and provide opportunity for knowledge enhancement through Training, Seminars, Conferences etc.