Controller
About the role
Position Summary: Commonwealth Equipment Corporation (CEC) seeks a hands-on Controller to lead accounting operations and provide financial insight that improves profitability, cash flow, and business decisions. Reporting to the CFO, the Controller owns the integrity of the books, timely financial reporting, treasury management, internal controls, budgeting, forecasting, and accounting team performance across equipment sales, rental, parts, and service operations. The successful candidate is a change agent who raises standards, challenges inefficient processes, and turns better practices into consistent daily execution. This leader combines strong accounting judgment with operational curiosity, clear communication, and a continuous improvement mindset.
Location: Ashley, Pennsylvania | Accounting and Finance | Reports to: CFO | Direct reports: Four
Responsibilities
- Team Leadership: Manage four direct reports: A/R Specialist, A/P Specialist, Billing Supervisor, and Billing Representative for Parts and Service.
- Accounting Operations and Financial Reporting: Own the monthly and year-end close, general ledger, journal entries, reconciliations, accruals, account classifications, and applicable consolidations and eliminations. Deliver accurate P&L, balance sheet, cash flow reporting, and supporting schedules including banking related items such as floor plans and borrowing base preparations. Oversee billing, A/R, A/P, payroll accounting including commission and bonus payouts, cash activity, and transaction cutoff. Ensure complete, timely invoicing and appropriate recognition of equipment sales, rental, parts, service, and warranty activity. Reconcile equipment inventory, rental fleet, parts, work in process, fixed assets, and floor plan financing to operational records. Coordinate physical inventory reconciliations and maintain support for depreciation, capitalization, inventory reserves, and bad debt estimates.
- Controls Compliance and Risk Management: Design, document, and enforce accounting policies, approval limits, segregation of duties, reconciliations, audit trails, and record retention. Review control effectiveness as processes and systems change. Strengthen vendor setup, payment verification, bank reconciliations, and financial system access controls in partnership with IT and the CFO. Investigate exceptions, document root causes, and complete corrective actions. Coordinate external audit or review requests, tax-provider schedules, government filings, and lender reporting. Support sales and use tax processes, debt and lease schedules, and covenant monitoring; escalate compliance concerns and material judgments to the CFO. Approve journal entries, reconciliations, routine payments, and accounting treatments within delegated authority. Protect confidential employee, customer, vendor, banking, and company information.
- Planning Analysis and Business Partnership: Lead the annual budget and rolling forecast with documented operational drivers and accountable department-owner inputs. Challenge assumptions, explain variances, and identify actions that improve performance. Prepare monthly KPI, variance, and trend reporting for the CFO and department leaders. Reconcile management reporting to the general ledger and maintain consistent metric definitions and source documentation. Maintain and challenge the weekly 13-week cash flow forecast, capturing collections, inventory purchases, payroll, debt service, and major spending. Analyze working capital, cash conversion cycle, and drivers of line-of-credit usage. Partner with A/R