Zarin Patel is the BBC's Chief Financial Officer. She took up the post on 1 December 2004 following the promotion of John Smith to Chief Operating Officer. She was previously Head of Revenue Management, the department within the BBC responsible for collecting the Television licence, a job she had held since 2001. She joined the BBC in 1998 as Group Financial Controller. Her career before the BBC was spent entirely with KPMG, whom she joined after graduating from the London School of Economics in 1982.
In 2004 Zarin Patel was declared "Client Marketer of the Year" by Precision Marketing, a London based Direct Marketing trade magazine.