Deputy MLRO / Senior Compliance Manager

Deputy MLRO / Senior Compliance Manager

Location: Hybrid / London Office
Reporting to: Danny Mead (Head of Compliance & MLRO)
Department: Compliance
Direct Reports: Onboarding Lead, Compliance Specialist)

About the Role

We are seeking a commercially minded Deputy MLRO / Senior Compliance Manager to support the continued growth of our multi-jurisdictional fintech business. This role will act as a key deputy to the Head of Compliance & MLRO, helping to oversee our compliance and financial crime framework while supporting regulatory obligations across multiple jurisdictions.

The successful candidate will combine strong technical compliance and AML expertise with a pragmatic, risk-based approach suitable for a fast-paced fintech environment. They will play a critical role in strengthening and leading the compliance function, supporting business growth initiatives, and providing leadership across day-to-day compliance operations.

This is an excellent opportunity for an experienced compliance professional seeking a broad role with significant exposure to senior stakeholders, regulators, and strategic business initiatives.

Key Responsibilities

Compliance & Regulatory Oversight

• Support the Head of Compliance & MLRO in maintaining and enhancing the firm's compliance framework across all regulated jurisdictions.


• Monitor regulatory developments and assess their impact on the business, ensuring timely implementation of regulatory changes.


• Assist in maintaining policies, procedures, controls, governance arrangements and reporting to ensure ongoing regulatory compliance.


• Provide practical compliance guidance to business stakeholders across all departments.


• Support regulatory applications, authorisations and audits.


• Assist in the preparation of management information, board reports, committee papers, and regulatory reporting.

Financial Crime & AML

• Act as deputy to the MLRO and support the ongoing operation of the firm's Anti-Money Laundering (AML), Counter-Terrorist Financing (CTF), sanctions, and financial crime frameworks.


• Review and oversee higher-risk escalations and enhanced due diligence cases.


• Assist with the investigation of suspicious activity and preparation of internal reports and external suspicious activity reports where required.


• Support the delivery of enterprise-wide financial crime risk assessments.


• Monitor the effectiveness of transaction monitoring, screening, onboarding, and ongoing monitoring controls.


• Ensure financial crime policies and procedures remain proportionate and aligned to regulatory expectations.

Compliance Monitoring & Risk Management

• Develop and execute compliance monitoring activities and thematic reviews.


• Identify compliance and financial crime risks and work with business stakeholders to implement appropriate remediation plans.


• Maintain compliance risk registers and support enterprise risk management processes.


• Track regulatory findings, internal audit actions, and compliance issues through to completion.

Business Partnering & Strategic Support

• Act as a trusted advisor to business leaders, providing commercially balanced compliance guidance.


• Partner with Team Heads to ensure compliance considerations are embedded into business initiatives.

Leadership & Team Development

• Provide day-to-day support, guidance, and mentoring to more junior compliance team members.


• Help build a scalable compliance function capable of supporting future business growth.


• Deputise for the Head of Compliance & MLRO during periods of absence.

Skills & Experience

Essential

• 5+ years' experience in Compliance, Financial Crime, AML, or Regulatory Risk roles within fintech, payments, e-money, banking, crypto, or financial services.


• Strong understanding of AML/CTF regulations, sanctions frameworks, and financial crime controls.


• Experience working within regulated financial services businesses operating across multiple jurisdictions.


• Experience managing regulatory interactions, audits, inspections, or compliance reviews.


• Strong knowledge of risk-based compliance frameworks and governance practices.


• Excellent stakeholder management skills with the ability to influence at all levels of the organisation.


• Ability to balance regulatory requirements with commercial business objectives.


• Strong written communication and report-writing capabilities.


• Highly organised with the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.

Desirable

• Previous experience acting as Deputy MLRO, Nominated Officer, MLRO delegate, or equivalent.


• Experience within payments, e-money, card acquiring, embedded finance, digital banking, or crypto sectors.


• Experience supporting regulatory licences and authorisations in multiple jurisdictions.


• Strong familiarity with compliance technology, automated transaction monitoring tools, and AI-enabled compliance solutions, ideally including Sumsub, Chainalysis, and Intercom.


• Professional compliance qualification (ICA, ACAMS, CISI, or equivalent).

Success Measures

Within the first 6 months, the successful candidate will:

• Establish themselves as a trusted deputy to the Head of Compliance & MLRO.


• Improve the scalability and effectiveness of the compliance and financial crime framework.


• Reduce escalation dependency on senior leadership through stronger team structure and delegation.


• Successfully support regulatory obligations across all operating jurisdictions.


• Strengthen compliance partnership with Product, Technology, and Operations teams to support business growth while maintaining robust regulatory standards.