Duties, Responsibilities or Job Profile of a SECTION OFFICER.

                         SECTION OFFICER

•   General Duties -

     (i)  Distribution of work among the staff as evenly as possible;

     (ii)  Training, helping and advising the staff;

     (iii) Management and co-ordination of the work;

     (iv) Maintenance of order and discipline in the section;

     (v)  Maintenance of a list of residential addresses of the Staff.

•   Responsibilities relating to Dak -

   (vi) to go through the receipts;

   (vii) to submit receipts which should be seen by the Branch Officer or higher officers at the dak stage;

   (viii) to keep a watch on any hold-up in the movement of dak; and

   (ix)  to scrutinize the section diary once a week to know that it is being properly attained.

•    Responsibilities relating to issue of draft -

  (x) to see that all corrections have been made in the draft before it is marked for issue;

  (xi) to indicate whether a clean copy of the draft is necessary;

  (xii) to indicate the number of spare copies required;

  (xiii) to check whether all enclosures are attached;

  (xiv) to indicate priority marking;

  (xv)  to indicate mode of dispatch.

•   Responsibility of efficient and expeditious disposal of work and checks on delays -

    (xvi) to keep a note of important receipts with a view to watching the progress of action;

    (xvii) to ensure timely submission of arrear and other returns;

    (xviii)to undertake inspection of Assistants’ table to ensure that no paper of file has been overlooked;

    (xix)to ensure that cases are not held up at any stage;

    (xx)to go through the list of periodical returns every week and take suitable action on items requiring attention during next week.

•Independent disposal of cases -

He should take independently action of the following types -

   (xxi)issuing reminders; obtaining or supplying factual information of a non-classified nature;

• any other action which a Section Officer is authorized to take independently.

  (xxii) Duties in respect of recording and indexing -

• to approve the recording of files and their classification;
• to review the recorded file before destruction;
• to order and supervise periodic weeding of unwanted spare copies;
• ensuring proper maintenance of registers required to be maintained in the section;
• Ensuring proper maintenance of reference books, Office Orders etc. and keep them up-to-date;
• Ensuring neatness and tidiness in the Section;
• Dealing with important and complicated cases himself;

Ensuring strict compliance with Departmental Security Instructions.

As per Notification from Department if Finance, Punjab number 16890-TA(II)-82/10369.

As you are aware, the effective discharge of accounts function and effective financial control is a very important part of functioning in all departments of the Government. To assist the Heeds of Departments in the discharge of these functions, various accounts posts have been sanctioned in the departments and trained accounts staff is posted on these by the Finance Department (T&A Branch). To ensure that the services of this staff are utilized effectively. It is very important that their functions are clearly and uniformly defined, end those activities related to accounts and finance matters are handled by the accounts staff.

A review of the duties and functions entrusted to the charge of the account’s personnel posted in the various departments by the Finance Department was recently conducted by Deputy Secretary, Finance and It was found that there is little uniformity in the different departments of the Government in this regard, and the range of functions entrusted to accounts staff varies widely from department to department. It was found that in certain cases important financial and accounts functions were not entrusted to accounts staff, and also functions not relating to this area were being entrusted to accounts staff. With a view to ensure that accounts staff posted in the departments carry out the functions for which they have been posted so as to ensure a greater degree of efficiency in financial control by the Heads of Departments, it has been decided that the following areas of responsibility be entrusted to the Chief Accounts Officers, Accounts Officers and Assistant Accounts Officers posted by the Finance Department in your department and its subordinate offices : —

• Preparation of budget estimates, supple­mentary estimates.
• Watching of actuals against appropriations, scrutiny of proposals for transfer, re-appropriations of funds from one head to another before these are sanctioned by Heads of Departments or are forwarded to the Government.
• Scrutiny of departmental schemes generally and all proposals for fresh expenditure in particular from the financial and accounts point of view.
• To act as DDO on behalf of Heads of departments/Heads of Offices, to make payments on account of pay and allowances, con­tingencies etc. in conformity with the financial rules applicable to each class of payment.
• To deal with the audit and inspection reports, audit objections and to take action to rectify and prevent the irregularities pointed out by the State Accountant General.
• Maintenance and up-keep     of the service records of all categories of Establishment, Maintenance of G.P. Fund Accounts (Class- IV), CDS Accounts. Account of Loans and advances etc. and determination of interest therein.
• To furnish to the State Accountant General, the certificate of permanent advance annually, submission of statements of accounts to Government etc.
• Reconciliation of accounts     of department with those maintained by the Slate Account­ant General.
• To conduct internal audit of accounts kept in subordinate offices under the departmental rules.
• To render advice on all the matters involving financial implications/expenditures of Govern­ment money etc. to prevent commission of any financial regularity.
• To conduct investigation of irregularities revealed as a result of scrutiny of accounts maintained by the Subordinate Offices.
• Preparation of Pension Cases.

In addition to the above, it has also been decided that duties other than those indicated above or such duties as do not relate to accounts or finance matters, should not be entrusted to accounts personnel in your department.