Compliance Officer / MLRO – Payments

About SG EPAY PTE. LTD.

SG EPAY PTE. LTD. is a MAS-licensed Payment Institution providing merchant acquisition, domestic money transfer, and cross-border money transfer services.

We are looking for an experienced Compliance Officer / Money Laundering Reporting Officer (MLRO) to oversee the company’s compliance, AML/CFT, KYC/KYB, regulatory reporting, merchant risk, and payment scheme compliance functions.

The ideal candidate should have relevant experience in the payments, fintech, merchant acquiring, PayFac, remittance, banking, or regulated financial services industry, with strong knowledge of MAS requirements applicable to licensed payment institutions, including MAS Notice PSN01.

Key Responsibilities

• Act as the company’s Compliance Officer and MLRO.
• Oversee the company’s AML/CFT compliance framework, policies, procedures, and internal controls.
• Ensure compliance with the Payment Services Act, MAS Notices and Guidelines, including MAS Notice PSN01 and related AML/CFT requirements.
• Conduct and review KYC/KYB due diligence for merchants, customers, directors, shareholders, and ultimate beneficial owners.
• Perform merchant and customer risk assessments, including onboarding reviews, enhanced due diligence, ongoing monitoring, and periodic reviews.
• Review high-risk merchants, complex ownership structures, adverse media findings, sanctions screening alerts, and transaction monitoring alerts.
• Identify suspicious or unusual activities and assess whether escalation or regulatory reporting is required.
• Prepare and file Suspicious Transaction Reports with STRO where required.
• Liaise with MAS, STRO, banks, acquiring partners, payment schemes, auditors, and other external stakeholders on compliance and risk matters.
• Support MAS queries, regulatory inspections, audits, bank due diligence reviews, and acquiring partner compliance questionnaires.
• Oversee transaction monitoring, merchant risk monitoring, fraud monitoring, chargeback monitoring, and content compliance reviews.
• Monitor merchant activities against relevant Visa and Mastercard risk monitoring requirements, including fraud, dispute, chargeback, and excessive-risk programmes.
• Support monitoring and assessment of scheme-related risk programmes, including Visa VAMP and other Visa/Mastercard merchant monitoring rules.
• Maintain compliance registers, STR assessment records, risk assessments, audit trails, investigation records, and management reporting.
• Provide compliance advice to senior management and business teams on new merchants, payment flows, products, risk issues, and regulatory obligations.
• Conduct internal compliance training on AML/CFT, sanctions, KYC/KYB, merchant risk, fraud, chargebacks, and regulatory compliance.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Law, Finance, Accounting, Business, or a related discipline.
• Minimum 4 to 6 years of compliance, AML/CFT, KYC/KYB, merchant risk, or regulatory compliance experience.
• Prior experience in payments, fintech, merchant acquiring, PayFac, payment gateway, remittance, banking, or regulated financial services is strongly preferred.
• Good working knowledge of MAS requirements applicable to licensed payment institutions, especially MAS Notice PSN01.
• Experience dealing with MAS queries, regulatory inspections, regulatory filings, or supervisory reviews will be strongly preferred.
• Hands-on experience preparing, assessing, or filing Suspicious Transaction Reports with STRO.
• Strong knowledge of KYC/KYB, AML/CFT, sanctions screening, adverse media screening, transaction monitoring, and enhanced due diligence.
• Familiarity with merchant onboarding, website and content compliance review, fraud monitoring, chargeback monitoring, and payment risk management.
• Familiarity with Visa and Mastercard risk rules, including fraud, dispute, chargeback monitoring, excessive-risk monitoring, and programmes such as VAMP, will be a strong advantage.
• Able to communicate effectively with regulators, banks, acquiring partners, auditors, payment schemes, and internal stakeholders.
• Strong analytical, documentation, investigation, and risk assessment skills.
• Able to work independently and exercise sound judgment in a regulated payment environment.
• Professional certifications such as ACAMS, CAMS, ICA, or equivalent will be an advantage.
• Bilingual ability in English and Mandarin will be an advantage, as the role may involve reviewing Chinese-language merchant documents and communicating with Mandarin-speaking stakeholders.

Preferred Experience

• Prior experience as Compliance Officer, AML Officer, MLRO, Risk Officer, or Merchant Risk Officer in a payment institution, acquirer, PayFac, payment gateway, remittance company, fintech, or bank.
• Experience with MAS-licensed payment institutions under the Payment Services Act.
• Experience handling MAS information requests, bank/acquirer due diligence reviews, audit reviews, and regulatory questionnaires.
• Experience reviewing high-risk merchants, cross-border payment flows, UBO structures, adverse media cases, and suspicious activity escalations.
• Experience monitoring scheme risk metrics, including fraud ratios, dispute ratios, chargeback ratios, and Visa/Mastercard merchant monitoring programmes.

Key Competencies

• Strong understanding of AML/CFT and payment regulatory compliance.
• Good knowledge of payment business models, merchant acquiring, PayFac operations, and cross-border payment risks.
• Strong judgment in identifying suspicious activity, high-risk merchants, and potential regulatory issues.
• Detail-oriented, structured, and able to maintain clear audit trails.
• Able to balance business requirements with regulatory, AML/CFT, and scheme risk obligations.
• Comfortable working in a fast-paced fintech and payment environment.