Financial Crime QA Manager

Bank of London; City Of London; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading financial institution is seeking a Financial Crime Quality Assurance Manager to enhance the quality and effectiveness of its financial crime operations. The role involves leading the QA framework, conducting reviews, and ensuring compliance with UK regulations. Ideal candidates will have extensive experience in financial crime control and excellent communication skills. This position is based in London with possible hybrid working arrangements.

Qualifications

• Proven experience in financial crime quality assurance/control in a regulated banking environment.
• Strong knowledge of UK AML/CTF and regulatory expectations.
• Ability to develop and implement oversight frameworks.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design and execution of a QA framework for financial crime processes.
• Conduct independent reviews of case handling to assess control effectiveness.
• Deliver a tiered QA model for feedback and improvement.

Skills

Financial crime quality assurance/control

Knowledge of UK AML/CTF regulations

Experience with financial crime controls

Understanding of three lines of defence model

Proficiency with financial crime technology platforms

Communication and documentation skills

Tools

ComplyAdvantage

LexisNexis

Dun & Bradstreet

Job description

Overview

Join Bank of London as Financial Crime Quality Assurance Manager and take ownership of building and embedding a first-line assurance capability that uplifts the quality, consistency, and effectiveness of Financial Crime Operations across the Bank. You will lead the operational delivery of a risk-based QA programme, providing independent assessment of the Bank's control performance across onboarding, transaction monitoring, and ongoing due diligence processes.

You will act as a critical feedback loop, using quality assurance insights to drive continuous improvement in policy implementation, training, and operational control execution. Your contribution will be instrumental in streamlining decision-making, reinforcing accountability, and ensuring the Bank operates with clarity, rigour, and efficiency across its financial crime processes.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design and execution of a first-line Quality Assurance (QA) framework across core financial crime processes including onboarding, transaction monitoring, sanctions screening, and ongoing due diligence.


• Conduct independent reviews of case handling and decision-making to assess control effectiveness, consistency, and alignment with internal policies and regulatory expectations.


• Deliver a tiered QA model - incorporating real-time reviews for high-risk clients and retrospective sampling for lower-risk activity - to drive timely feedback and reduce approval bottlenecks.


• Identify knowledge gaps, procedural weaknesses, and control design failures, and feed structured insights into operational teams, training functions, and policy updates.


• Partner with 1LOD teams (e.g. Client Onboarding, CDD, Screening, TM, Fraud Ops) and 2LOD Compliance to ensure QA findings support uplift of controls, training, and procedural guidance.


• Develop and maintain a centralised QA MI suite, enabling visibility of key trends, recurring issues, and control performance across teams and client segments.


• Act as a key contributor to audit and regulatory readiness by maintaining well-evidenced QA outputs and tracking remediation of findings.


• Drive continuous improvement in operational quality and assurance maturity, supporting a high-performance culture and robust financial crime governance.


• Support the assessment and enhancement of QA tooling, sampling methodologies, and feedback mechanisms to ensure the framework remains scalable and risk-aligned.

Requirements

• Proven experience in financial crime quality assurance/control within a regulated banking or financial services environment.


• Strong knowledge of UK AML/CTF, sanctions, and fraud regulations, and familiarity with regulatory expectations from the FCA, PRA, and JMLSG.


• Experience overseeing financial crime controls for high-risk client segments such as NBFIs, MSBs, FX brokers, and crypto firms.


• Deep understanding of clients' financial crime control frameworks, including onboarding, transaction monitoring, sanctions screening, and MI reporting.


• Strong working knowledge of the three lines of defence model, with demonstrated effectiveness operating within the First Line of Defence (1LOD).


• Ability to develop and implement standardised frameworks for client oversight, including ongoing due diligence and MI collection.


• Proficiency with financial crime technology platforms (e.g. ComplyAdvantage, LexisNexis, Dun & Bradstreet) and experience using data to drive risk-based decisions.


• Demonstrated ability to lead through change, including tooling enhancements, control remediation, or framework improvements.


• Excellent communication and documentation skills, with a focus on analytical thinking, clarity of risk articulation, and senior stakeholder engagement.

Location

• London (In Office) or Belfast (Hybrid, in office 4 Days)


• Travel to other locations may be required on occasion.

Diversity

Bank of London is an equal opportunity employer committed to inclusion, diversity and belonging. All qualified applicants are welcome and will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, colour, age, religion or religious expression, sex, sexual orientation, gender or gender identity and expression, transgender, national origin, or military veteran status.