Projects Cost Controller: Budgeting & Cost Forecasting

Fqm(A) First Quantum Minerals (Australia) Pty Limited; Australia; Remote; AUD 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

First Quantum Minerals is seeking a Projects Cost Controller in Western Australia to support the cost control team by maintaining accurate costing for inventory and overheads within the financial system and ensuring proper reconciliations between the general ledger and cost accounting system.

You will assist lead cost controllers across projects, set up budgets, maintain forecasts, prepare monthly variance analyses, and provide data-driven insights to project managers for strategic decisions.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Accountancy or Economics preferred.
• 2 years working experience in a similar position within a mining environment.
• Strong analytical skills.
• Ability to communicate effectively both written and verbally.
• Proficiency in MS Office applications especially Excel.
• High level of attention to detail.
• Good time management skills and ability to meet deadlines.
• A team player who works well under pressure and has a flexible approach to work.

Responsibilities

• Support lead/senior cost controllers in multiple projects in South America.
• Review material requisitions to ensure alignment with approved project budget/forecast and have the correct cost code to maintain budget control.
• Assist PE/PM in setting up project budget and forecast spreadsheets by allocating appropriate cost codes and uploading into ERP system.
• Maintain project cost forecasts in Excel across multiple projects ensuring accuracy, consistency and integrity of costs to support planning and decision making.
• Review monthly site cost report and ensure costs have been coded to the correct project along with applying the correct cost codes, with any project coding issues discussed and resolved with the site accountant.
• Provide accurate and timely project cost data to project managers and senior cost controllers to help support both strategic and operational financial decision making.
• Distribute site-wide costs using ERP system journal function to various projects based on proportional splits such as site manhours.
• Monitor project forecasts and track actual costs versus approved budgets, identify cost trends with the early identification of potential cost overruns for escalation to Project Managers.
• Utilise various PowerBI reports to assist in cost control activities such as month end cost reports and other cost control related analysis and reporting such as labour manhour cost distributions.
• Provide monthly variance analysis explaining budget over-runs and when actual monthly costs differ from forecasted cash flows.
• Advise on and assist to resolve cost discrepancies by coordinating with suppliers, site teams, cost control, project managers, procurement, finance and accounts to ensure these are resolved in a timely manner.
• Assist with tracking purchase order variations and ensuring cost impacts are recorded in project forecasts.
• Maintain accurate and complete documentation for audits, internal reviews and approvals to ensure compliance throughout the end‑to‑end cost control and invoicing process.
• Analyse process bottlenecks in approval workflows and cost reporting, implementing improvements to ensure timely accurate supplier payments and efficient cost processing.
• Support lead/senior cost controller on more complex tasks and detailed analysis.
• Review information from various project functions to provide an overall report of project progress and performance based on site, procurement and expediting/logistics progress

Skills

Analytical skills

Communication skills

Excel proficiency

Attention to detail

Time management

Team player

Education

Bachelor's degree in Accountancy or Economics

Tools

ERP system

PowerBI

Job description

First Quantum Minerals is seeking a Projects Cost Controller in Western Australia to support the cost control team by maintaining accurate costing for inventory and overheads within the financial system and ensuring proper reconciliations between the general ledger and cost accounting system.

You will assist lead cost controllers across projects, set up budgets, maintain forecasts, prepare monthly variance analyses, and provide data-driven insights to project managers for strategic decisions.