Serbia Justice Functional Review

Internal Performance Assessment > Financial Management

f. Financial Management Staffing

  1. The professional competence of financial staff appears to be adequate. The financial staff with whom the members of the Functional Review team held meetings displayed a high level of competence and dedication. However, their responsibilities are currently overwhelmingly focused on the challenges surrounding compliance and arrears. If the courts become more autonomous in managing their resources, financial staff would need to enhance their skills in the area of financial analysis and planning. Financial staff would need to learn how to play a more proactive role in managing the court performance and support Court Presidents and managers in making strategic decisions. In all the occasions where the Functional Review team asked the financial staff whether they monitored costs-per-case, the standard response was that they probably could do it but did not see a point in doing it.
  2. There is a severe shortage of financial staff in the courts. As of early 2014, one Appellate, 21 Basic and eight Misdemeanor Courts did not have any financial staff at all.727 According to court financial officers, the financial staff’s position is graded below their counterparts’ in other agencies within the public sector. This may be one of the reasons for their shortage. This shortage (and the reasons for it) will need to be addressed to enable financial management to improve.