Viraja Paranjape

• Performing Quality Assurance Reviews (QAR) independently for various Balance sheet GL accounts reconciled by the various account owners.
• Responsible for engaging with Regional Leads, various Account owners and stakeholders at Director and Executive Director levels for understanding the underlying process and reconciliation performance.
• Ensuring compliance with the GL account ownership policy, SOX guidelines, accounting manual (based on IFRS) and standards set for reconciliation.
• Review of design and operating effectiveness of SOX Controls.
• Ensuring availability of sufficient evidences for the balances signed off.
• Ensuring appropriate presentation and disclosure of balances in Financial statement lines.
• Giving recommendations for observations after review and testing the implementation of recommendations.
• Maintaining documentation for the reviews performed.
• Preparation of various management information reports and meeting with Regional and Global QAR teams.
• Acting as a single point of contact for EMEA region for any query/ support.

• Accounting to Reporting Lead for India R&D and ASEAN entities - Oct 2019 – Dec 2022.
• Managed end-to-end month-close activities: completeness and correctness of group reporting numbers, trial balance review, bank GL clearing, intercompany reconciliation, and finalization of the income statement and balance sheet for group reporting in SBFC.
• Conducted lock meetings with business teams, presented variance analysis, and ensured compliance with IFRS.
• Explained functional expense variances above thresholds, and analyzed foreign exchange exposure.
• Review of reconciliations: sales, COGS, inventory, intercompany balances as per books with subsystem balances, bank clearing, balance sheet GL reconciliations, and preparing payroll reconciliation.
• Prepared IND AS financial statements, including notes to accounts, actuarial valuation entries, lease accounting entries, coordinated with auditors, and resolved audit queries.
• Prepared AR aging reports, proposed bad debt provisions, and prepared daily sales outstanding reports for business teams.
• Collaborated with Direct and Indirect Tax teams on advance tax, GST, and transfer pricing matters.
• Prepared monthly cash forecasts and variance analysis against actuals for five Indian entities.
• Prepared the quarterly related party disclosures for five India entities.
• Collaborated with group auditors and provided data for local audits of ASEAN entities, reviewed the trial balance of each entity, standardized the TB review process, served as the SPOC for business leaders from all entities, and delivered any ad-hoc requirements of the business team.

Global Role of Central Lease Accountant – May 2021 – Dec 2022.

• Managed lease accounting for 14 global entities: updated contracts in Tagetik, posted entries in SAP, and ensured the completeness and accuracy of lease data.
• Opened and closed accounting periods, updated index, and interest rates in Tagetik, and supported country accountants with contract corrections and queries.
• Coordinated with group auditors on lease-related requirements, and resolved audit issues.
• Enabled a smooth transition from country-specific to process-based global operations; led stakeholder engagement across business leaders, auditors, and support functions.

Skills and Achievements

• Conducted a training session on ICF.
• IND AS - first-time adoption of IND AS in the Indian entity.
• Merger of two entities in Tagetik from a lease accounting perspective.
• Change management – ensuring a smooth transition in ways of working from leading one country to process-wise working for multiple countries.
• Adapting to new systems: Worked on GL mapping for SAP S/4 HANA implementation.

• Testing of financial controls over accounting and reporting (ICFR) and SOX Controls.
• Internal audit of manpower services, animal feed & food products, manufacturing, leasing and real estate companies.
• Conducting concurrent reviews of a listed company under corporate debt restructuring (CDR) from renewable energy sector as agreed with the lead bankers.
• Engaging with various clients.
• Handled team of 2 members.

• On deployment as Compliance officer in Syngenta - Oct 2016 – May 2017.
• Ensuring effective implementation of the Internal Control Framework and SOX compliance. Control Testing, assisting control owners in performing their SOX controls, preparing Delegation of Authority (DoA) matrix and ensuring adherence thereto, supporting assessment and mitigation of Segregation of Duties (SoD) risks occurring in SAP, facilitating the internal and external audit.
• As Consultant in Ankekshan – Feb – Sep 2016.
• Worked on assignments in renowned companies from construction, manufacturing, trading and service sectors in various business processes.
• Understanding the business process and preparing the standard process documents.
• Identifying financial risks and existing controls.
• Designing Risk Control Matrices.
• Testing the effectiveness and timeliness of financial controls.
• Involved in a project of preparing standardized Risk Control Matrices for smaller entities to comply with the requirements Internal Controls over Financial Reporting of Companies Act, 2013.

• Company Overview: Pune
• Statutory Audit and Taxation.
• Statutory audit of a multi-state scheduled co-operative bank, colleges of educational trust.
• Tax audit of Co-operative bank, individuals and firms.
• VAT Audit of a Multi-National Company till finalization level.
• Internal Audit.
• Expenses, statutory payments, revenue, fixed assets, investments, branch reconciliation, sensitive stationery, cash, deposits, other liabilities, KYC compliance, bank reconciliation, transport and freight, labor laws and process of subcontracting.
• Pune