Transaction Monitoring Lead

We are looking for someone to take ownership of Transaction Monitoring at BCB and shape its next stage. You will run the function day to day, leading a globally dispersed team of over 10 analysts and senior analysts, set the standard for what good looks like, and deliver it: refine rules so they focus on real risk, extend coverage as our products grow, automate manual, low-judgement work, and build a team that investigates well and escalates with confidence. You report to the Head of Financial Crime Operations and you will have real authority over how transaction monitoring works across fiat and crypto, as the first line of defence for the Group.

This is a role for someone who sees a process that could work better and improves it without waiting to be asked.

BCB moves fiat and digital assets 24/7 for some of the largest crypto businesses in the world, through our Client Console, API and BLINC instant settlement network. Monitoring has to keep pace with that volume and speed. We have solid foundations, and we want a leader who will build on them to create a function that is data-led, well documented, measurable and increasingly automated, and that keeps alert and case volumes under control as the business grows.

• The transaction monitoring framework for fiat and crypto across the Group, including rules, scenarios, thresholds, typologies and the documented rationale behind each.
• Confirm every product, entity and payment flow feeds the monitoring system completely and accurately, including new products before launch.
• Alert handling end to end: triage, investigation, escalation, case management and closure, with clear SLAs and quality standards, covering transaction monitoring alerts, sanctions and PEP screening hits on customers and counterparties.
• Backlog and capacity: keep alert and case queues within tolerance, plan rotas and capacity against volume growth, and step in quickly when backlogs build.
• Oversight of any outsourced or third-party review capacity, including SLA performance, quality and escalation standards.
• Decisions to escalate internal suspicious activity reports (ISARs) to the MLRO, and the quality of those reports: well reasoned, evidenced and on time, and support to the MLRO in preparing external SARs/STRs, including to the NCA, TRACFIN and FINTRAC. 
• Rule calibration tuning and effectiveness testing, using data to cut false positives and find the activity current rules miss. Document rationale behind each, with changes approved through BCB’s governance process in partnership with Compliance (2LOD) and the MLRO.
• Automation of manual, low-judgement, work, whether through vendor tooling, workflow automation, scripting or AI-assisted review.
• Blockchain analytics as part of monitoring, not a separate step.
• A quality assurance and quality control framework for the team, with sampling, feedback loops and results reported to governance.
• Management information for senior leadership and governance forums: volumes, backlog, ageing, conversion rates, quality results, emerging risk.
• Procedures (SOPs) for the function, kept current and usable by the people doing the work.
• Leadership of the TM team of over 10 people, working through senior analysts: team structure, hiring, coaching, and performance, and building senior analysts who can make day-to-day decisions without you. Building a robust operating model that increasingly relies upon efficiency, automated workflows and AI over increased headcount.
• Working relationships with Compliance, Onboarding, Fraud, Product, Engineering and Data, and with regulators and auditors when they review the function. Represent transaction monitoring at governance forums and deputise for the Head of Financial Crime Operations on monitoring matters. 

First 30 days. Review the current rules, alert volumes, backlog, team structure and procedures. Meet the team and key stakeholders. Present a written assessment of what works, what does not and what you will change first, with a sequenced plan and a view on capacity and resourcing .

First 90 days. Any backlog is cleared or on a committed recovery plan. Alerts are consistently worked within SLA. Rules have been reviewed and tuned, with documented rationale for each change and governance approval for each change. At least two manual processes are automated. MI is produced to a regular cadence for senior leadership to review. Every team member has clear objectives and a development plan.

First 3-6 months. Monitoring coverage maps to BCB's risk assessment and product set, including new products before launch. False positive rates are measurably lower with no loss of detection, and investigations are faster. QC and QA results consistently meet targets. The function would pass an internal audit or regulatory review without material findings, and the team runs well without you in every decision, senior analysts own day-to-day case decisions and you have a credible deputy in your absence.

• Five or more years in transaction monitoring or financial crime investigations, with at least two in a lead or management role.
• Experience in payments, e-money, banking or crypto. Experience across both fiat and crypto is a strong advantage.
• A track record of improving a monitoring function: you can describe a rule set you rebuilt, a backlog you cleared or a process you automated, and the numbers before and after.
• Experience of workforce and capacity planning, QA/QC frameworks and managing operational SLAs, including oversight of outsourced review capacity. 
• Hands-on knowledge of rule design, threshold calibration and effectiveness testing.
• Sound judgement on suspicion and SAR decisions, and the ability to teach that judgement to others.
• Working knowledge of UK AML requirements, including the MLRs and JMLSG guidance, and of sanctions regimes (UK, EU, OFAC, UN) and PEP screening. Some exposure to EU requirements. Experience of France’s ACPR or AMF and reporting to TRACFIN, reporting to FINTRAC in Canada and an understanding of the FIU reporting regimes in UAE and Switzerland is an advantage.
• Comfort with data. You can query it, interpret it and make decisions from it. SQL or Python is a plus.
• Experience with blockchain analytics tools such as Chainalysis, Elliptic or TRM.
• A clear view on where automation and AI help in monitoring, and where they need human oversight.
• Clear and precise written English. Your case notes, SOPs and MI are easy to follow and hard to misread.

You are direct and decisive. You make a call, explain it and own the outcome. You question rules and processes that exist only because they always have. You prefer fixing root causes over adding headcount. Can produce MI such as cost per alert and capacity forecasting against volume growth. You build trust with the team by being in the detail with them, and with senior stakeholders by telling them plainly what the risk is. You develop your senior analysts so decisions do not all route through you.

• Real ownership of a core control in a regulated, fast-growing firm and leadership of a team of over 10 people.
• Direct access to senior leadership. There are no barriers to talking to anyone in the business.
• 30 days annual leave each year
• 4 wellbeing days per year to prioritise your mental health 
• 1 company volunteering day per year
• Strong benefits package including; Private Healthcare, Pension, Income Protection (long-term absence), Life Insurance, Menopause Policy, and an enhanced Parental Leave policy
• Hybrid Working (we require you to attend our London office a minimum of 1 day a week) 

BCB Group provides regulated payment and trading services in crypto and fiat for the digital asset economy. Our clients include crypto exchanges, liquidity providers, market makers, investment firms, custodians, payment processors and wallet providers. We offer more than 40 fiat and cryptocurrencies, trading liquidity, 24/7 instant payments through BLINC, and crypto services, all through our Client Console and API. We are regulated in the UK, France, hold VQF status in Switzerland and registered with FINTRAC in Canada, and compliance sits at the centre of how we operate.

Our mission is to create the trusted platform to pay, store, trade and earn fiat and digital assets, globally, 24/7.

www.bcbgroup.com