Senior Associate – Financial Crime Operations (FTC)

Compliance Professionals; Greater London; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 85,000; Full time

Job summary

Compliance Professionals is seeking a Senior Associate to join the Financial Crime Operations team in the UK. Role focuses on transaction monitoring, sanctions screening, fraud risk management, and robust due diligence across onboarding and ongoing customer checks.

The ideal candidate will investigate alerts, assess risks, and liaise with MLRO for SARs while maintaining audit trails and regulatory compliance. Strong analytical and reporting skills are essential.

Qualifications

• Experience in UK regulated financial institutions.
• Strong AML, CTF, sanctions and fraud prevention knowledge.
• Experience investigating transaction monitoring and sanctions alerts.
• Knowledge of customer due diligence and enhanced due diligence.
• Familiarity with UK financial crime legislation and regulatory expectations.

Responsibilities

• Investigate transaction monitoring alerts and assess suspicious activity.
• Review sanctions screening alerts and potential matches.
• Identify fraud trends and support prevention initiatives.
• Review onboarding cases and enhanced due diligence documentation.
• Conduct detailed money laundering, sanctions, and fraud investigations.
• Support system enhancements and UAT for crime systems.
• Assist regulatory changes and ensure policy compliance.
• Contribute to risk assessments and audit preparation.
• Maintain accurate MI and operational metrics.

Skills

Financial Crime Ops

AML/CTF knowledge

Sanctions & Fraud

Due Diligence

UK regulatory knowledge

Analytical skills

Report writing

Communication skills

Job description

THE COMPANY:

Our client is a successful retail and corporate banking firm. They are looking to hire a Senior Associate within the Financial Crime Operations team.

THE RESPONSIBILITIES:

Transaction Monitoring:

• Investigate transaction monitoring alerts generated by automated monitoring systems.
• Analyse customer transactional behaviour to identify unusual or suspicious activity.
• Determine whether alerts represent genuine financial crime concerns or false positives.
• Escalate suspicious matters to the MLRO through internal Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs).
• Ensure investigations are completed within agreed service levels.

Sanctions Screening:

• Review customer and payment sanctions screening alerts.
• Investigate potential sanctions matches using internal systems and external intelligence.
• Escalate confirmed or potential sanctions concerns in accordance with Bank policy.
• Support sanctions list maintenance and screening effectiveness reviews.

Fraud Risk Management:

• Investigate fraud alerts
• Identify emerging fraud trends and recommend control improvements.
• Support fraud prevention initiatives

Customer Due Diligence:

• Review complex onboarding cases and enhanced due diligence documentation.
• Assess high-risk customers and complex ownership structures.
• Verify Ultimate Beneficial Owners (UBOs), directors, trustees, authorised signatories and other related parties.
• Ensure customer records comply with AML and sanctions requirements.

Financial Crime Investigations:

• Conduct detailed investigations into potential money laundering, terrorist financing, sanctions breaches and fraud.
• Liaise with business units to obtain supporting evidence.
• Maintain comprehensive investigation records and audit trails.
• Produce clear investigation reports with appropriate recommendations.

Financial Crime Systems:

• Support ongoing optimisation of transaction monitoring and sanctions screening systems.
• Participate in threshold, rule and scenario reviews.
• Identify opportunities to improve system effectiveness and reduce false positives.
• Assist in user acceptance testing (UAT) for financial crime system enhancements.

Regulatory Compliance:

• Assist in implementing regulatory changes affecting Financial Crime Operations.
• Ensure compliance with internal policies, procedures and risk appetite.

Governance and Risk:

• Contribute to periodic risk assessments and control reviews.
• Support internal and external audits.
• Identify process improvements to strengthen financial crime controls.
• Maintain accurate management information and operational metrics.

Quality Assurance:

• Ensure investigations are completed to a consistently high standard.
• Support quality assurance reviews and implement feedback. Promote continuous improvement across Financial Crime Operations.

EXPERIENCE REQUIRED:

• Experience within Financial Crime Operations in a UK regulated financial institution.
• Strong knowledge of AML, CTF, sanctions and fraud prevention.
• Experience investigating transaction monitoring and sanctions alerts.
• Understanding of customer due diligence and enhanced due diligence.
• Knowledge of UK financial crime legislation and regulatory expectations.
• Excellent analytical and investigative skills.
• Strong report writing and communication skills.

For further information please contact Natalie Eshelby