Financial Crime Systems Specialist

Newcastle Building Society; North Tyneside; Hybrid; GBP 44,000 - 57,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Corporate bonus scheme

Pension scheme

Annual performance reviews

Colleague mortgage scheme

Electric car salary sacrifice

Life assurance (4x salary)

Income protection

Access to financial advisers

Discounts

Private medical insurance

Health cash plan

Employee assistance programme

Onsite gym

Volunteering days

Cycle to work scheme

Job summary

Newcastle Building Society is seeking a Financial Crime Systems Specialist in the North East to protect customers by managing and enhancing our core financial crime technology systems and controls. This hands-on role owns day-to-day administration, config and performance tuning, builds detection rules and analyses alerts to balance effective risk management with a positive customer experience.

You will work with colleagues across Financial Crime, Operations, Risk, Technology and Change to

Qualifications

• Experience in Financial Crime/Fraud/AML or Compliance with data-driven risk management.
• Strong analytical skills and ability to translate data into actionable controls.
• Experience configuring and tuning detection rules and system parameters.

Responsibilities

• Own day-to-day administration, configuration and performance of financial crime systems.
• Develop and refine detection rules to reduce false positives.
• Analyze alert volumes and system performance; collaborate with stakeholders across Financial Crime, Operations, Risk, Technology and Change.
• Support regulatory and internal audits with evidence of control effectiveness.

Skills

Transaction monitoring

Fraud prevention

Sanctions screening

Payment verification

Tools

LexisNexis

SIRA

JADE

Job description

Job Posting Title

Financial Crime Systems Specialist

£43,867.00 - £56,976.00

About the Role

As a Financial Crime Systems Specialist, you’ll play a critical role in protecting the Society and its customers from financial crime by managing, optimising and enhancing our core financial crime technology systems and controls.

This is a hands-on technical role where you’ll take ownership of the day-to-day administration, configuration and performance of our financial crime systems. You’ll be responsible for building and refining detection rules, tuning controls, analysing system performance and ensuring our technology remains effective against evolving financial crime threats.

You’ll act as the subject matter expert for key fraud, screening and transaction monitoring systems. You’ll analyse alert volumes and outcomes, identify opportunities to improve detection capabilities, reduce false positives and ensure controls deliver robust, risk-based outcomes while supporting a positive customer experience.

The role offers a unique blend of technology, data analysis, financial crime expertise and change delivery. You’ll support system enhancements and upgrades, lead testing activities, provide insight on control effectiveness and work closely with colleagues across Financial Crime, Operations, Risk, Technology and Change to strengthen our overall control environment.

You’ll also play an important role in ensuring systems remain compliant, well-governed and audit-ready, providing evidence of control effectiveness and supporting regulatory and internal reviews. Through continuous optimisation and innovation, you’ll help strengthen our ability to detect and prevent fraud, money laundering, sanctions breaches and other financial crime risks.

About You

You’ll have experience working within a Financial Crime, Fraud, AML or Compliance environment and a strong understanding of how technology and data can be used to identify and manage financial crime risk.

You’ll be comfortable managing financial crime systems and controls, with experience of transaction monitoring, fraud prevention, sanctions screening or payment verification platforms. Exposure to systems such as LexisNexis, SIRA and JADE or similar systems would be highly advantageous.

You have strong analytical skills and enjoy using data to identify trends, assess control effectiveness and make recommendations that improve both risk outcomes and operational efficiency. You’ll be confident reviewing and optimising system rules, scenarios and parameters to ensure controls remain effective and proportionate.

You’ll also have experience supporting testing activities, system changes and process improvements, with the ability to document outcomes clearly and provide meaningful insight to a range of stakeholders. Strong communication skills are essential, as you’ll regularly collaborate with teams across Financial Crime, Technology, Operations and Risk. You’ll also need to able to outline system performance to NSSL clients.

Most importantly, you’re naturally curious, detail-oriented and driven by continuous improvement. You enjoy solving complex problems, challenging existing approaches and using technology to stay ahead of increasingly sophisticated financial crime threats.

About Us

The Newcastle Building Society Group comprises of Newcastle Building Society, Manchester Building Society, Newcastle Financial Advisers and Newcastle Strategic Solutions. Our purpose, connecting our communities with a better financial future inspires and directs our activities.

As an inclusive employer and member owned mutual, we aim to reflect the diverse communities we serve and encourage applications from candidates of all backgrounds. We believe everyone should feel valued, respected, and celebrated for who they are, we want colleagues to feel this is a place they belong. A place to be you.

What do you get in return? As well as receiving a competitive annual salary based on above-market pay scales, our reward package includes:

Financial

• Corporate bonus scheme (on target 10%, up to a maximum 15%)
• Pension scheme (up to 9% employer contribution)
• Annual performance related pay reviews
• Colleague mortgage scheme
• Electric car salary sacrifice scheme
• Life assurance (4x salary) and income protection
• Access to our financial advisers
• Access to a range of high street and online discounts

Work/Life Balance

• A 35-hour weekly contract
• 30 days’ annual leave + bank holidays
• The option to buy and sell up to 5 days’ holiday
• Hybrid working (typically 3 days’ home based)
• Above statutory family leave entitlement - 3 months full pay, 3 months half pay, regardless of gender or route to parenthood

Health and Wellbeing

• Private medical insurance
• Access to a health cash plan through a Medicash scheme
• Access to an employee assistance programme
• Free onsite gym at our Cobalt head office and access to discounted gym’s
• Two paid volunteering days’ each year
• Cycle to work scheme

Recognising there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to recruitment, we’re committed to ensuring every candidate has the opportunity to showcase their full potential throughout the recruitment process. We stride to make our processes as accessible as possible, if there are any ways in which we can provide support or make adjustments, we would love to discuss this with you,

Company:

Newcastle Strategic Solutions Limited