Senior Payments Risk Manager

IDEKU; Kuala Lumpur; On-site; MYR 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

IDEKU is seeking a senior payments risk professional to establish and lead its payments risk function as it prepares for a payment-services licence. The role will design and implement an end-to-end risk framework for the payments lifecycle and provide visible risk insights to management.

The successful candidate will build governance, risk registers and reporting, and work with Compliance, Legal, Finance and Technology.

Qualifications

• Substantial risk management experience in payments, acquiring, payment processing, e-money, fintech or another regulated payment environment.
• Demonstrated experience building or materially enhancing a payments risk framework, preferably for a payment-services licence or regulatory remediation.
• Strong knowledge of payment flows and associated risks including operational, fraud, merchant, counterparty, settlement, liquidity and technology.

Responsibilities

• Design, implement and maintain the payments risk framework in preparation for a licences.
• Map the end-to-end payment lifecycle and establish controls across onboarding, processing, settlement, reconciliation and refunds.
• Develop risk taxonomy, appetite, KRIs, exposure limits and escalation thresholds for management approval.
• Establish risk governance, reporting cycles and regular risk reporting for senior management.

Skills

Risk management

Payments

Regulatory compliance

Stakeholder management

Policy design

Job description

We are seeking a senior payments Risk professional to establish and lead its risk management function as it prepares to obtain a payment-services licence. The immediate mandate is to build a proportionate and operationally effective payments risk framework covering the end-to-end payment lifecycle, while giving management clear visibility of the risks arising from the company’s payment activities. The role may also provide functional support to other Group businesses while preserving local management accountability.

Location & Work Arrangement

This role can be based remotely in Malaysia, with a preference for candidates based in Kuala Lumpur. The individual will be required to travel to Singapore approximately once a month, for a period of 1-2 weeks, as required by business needs.

Key Responsibilities

• Design, implement and maintain the payments risk framework, policies, standards and supporting procedures in preparation for its payment-services licence.
• Map the end-to-end payment lifecycle and establish controls for merchant and customer onboarding, transaction processing, settlement, reconciliation, refunds, chargebacks and operational incidents.
• Develop the risk taxonomy, risk appetite statement, key risk indicators, exposure limits and escalation thresholds for management approval.
• Establish risk governance, committee reporting and a regular risk-reporting cycle for senior management and relevant governance bodies.
• Lead risk and control assessments across payment products, customer and merchant journeys, operations, technology and third parties, ensuring that owners and remediation dates are clear.
• Build and maintain risk registers, incident and loss-event reporting, issue management, control testing and monitoring processes.
• Assess and monitor operational, fraud, merchant, counterparty, settlement, liquidity, safeguarding, technology, cyber, outsourcing and business-continuity risks relevant to the payment business.
• Support the payment-services licence application and regulatory readiness reviews by demonstrating that the payments risk framework is appropriately designed, documented and embedded.
• Provide independent risk challenge for new payment products, material changes, outsourcing, third parties and other significant decisions.
• Partner with Compliance, Legal, Finance, Technology, Information Security and business teams to ensure risks are managed consistently and without unnecessary duplication.
• Where agreed, provide functional oversight and support to other Group entities, including the Indonesian finance business, without displacing locally required responsibilities.
• Coordinate with external advisers, auditors and regulators on risk matters when required.

Requirements

• Substantial risk management experience in payments, acquiring, payment processing, e-money, fintech or another regulated payment environment.
• Demonstrated experience building or materially enhancing a payments risk framework, preferably in connection with a payment-services licence, regulatory remediation or business scale-up.
• Strong knowledge of payment flows and associated operational, fraud, merchant, counterparty, settlement, liquidity, safeguarding, technology, cyber and third-party risks.
• Able to move between framework design and hands-on implementation, including writing policies, building registers and producing management reporting.
• Strong judgement, independence and stakeholder-management skills, with the confidence to provide constructive challenge.
• Strong familiarity with Singapore regulatory expectations for payment-service providers is preferred; relevant risk or payments qualifications are advantageous.