Financial Crime Analyst

Join ANNA Money as a Financial Crime Analyst and become a vital part of our mission to maintain the safety and integrity of our financial services. In this role, you will analyse various financial transactions to identify potential fraudulent activities and ensure compliance with all regulatory standards. You will work closely with our compliance and legal teams to investigate suspicious behaviours and contribute to the enhancement of our preventative measures.

Key Responsibilities

Monitor and Analyse Customer Transactions for Signs of Financial Crime (Fraud and Money Laundering)

Task: Continuously review customer transactions for suspicious activities that may indicate money laundering, fraud, or other financial crimes.

Strategies:

Automated monitoring tools: Leverage transaction monitoring systems to flag unusual patterns, such as large cash deposits, transfers to high-risk jurisdictions, or unusual behavior inconsistent with a customer’s profile.

Risk-based approach: Prioritise high-risk customers and sectors, ensuring that resources are focused on the most significant threats.

Behavioural profiling: Build customer profiles based on normal transactional activity and detect deviations that may suggest illicit behaviour.

Conduct Thorough Investigations into Flagged Transactions and Accounts

Task: When suspicious transactions are flagged, conduct a detailed investigation to assess the nature and intent behind the activity.

Strategies:

Investigative frameworks: Develop a step-by-step investigation process, including gathering documentation, analysing the customer’s history, and reviewing the context of the transactions.

Red flag identification: Ensure investigators are aware of red flags for financial crime, such as structuring, layering, or multiple accounts tied to suspicious entities.

Documentation and reporting: Maintain detailed records of findings, which are critical for regulatory reporting and internal audits.

Collaborate with Internal Teams to Develop Strategies for Improved Detection and Prevention of Financial Crime

Task: Work cross-functionally with compliance, risk, IT, and other relevant teams to enhance systems and controls.

Strategies:

Cross-team communication: Establish regular meetings with other teams to align on detection strategies, share insights, and implement joint initiatives.

Process improvement: Use feedback from investigations and monitoring to improve existing detection systems, such as tweaking rule thresholds or incorporating machine learning models.

Holistic view of risks: Combine data from different departments (e.g., customer service, fraud, compliance) to detect patterns that may be missed in isolated silos.

Prepare Comprehensive Reports Documenting Findings and Recommended Actions

Task: Document investigation outcomes, outlining evidence, analysis, and proposed actions (e.g., filing Suspicious Activity Reports [SARs], terminating accounts).

Strategies:

Structured reporting: Use consistent templates for reports, ensuring that they are clear, detailed, and aligned with regulatory requirements.

Actionable insights: Highlight recommendations in reports that guide next steps, such as enhancing controls, escalating cases to senior management, or making legal referrals.

Regulatory compliance: Ensure all reports meet the necessary standards for submission to regulators or law enforcement agencies.

Stay Up to Date with Industry Regulations, Best Practices, and Emerging Trends in Financial Crime Prevention

Task: Keep abreast of changes in financial crime regulations, enforcement actions, and new criminal techniques.

Strategies:

Continuous learning: Attend industry conferences, training programs, and webinars on AML and financial crime prevention.

Regulatory updates: Subscribe to bulletins or newsletters from regulators like the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), FinCEN, or local financial authorities to track regulatory changes.

Peer networking: Join AML and compliance professional groups to share knowledge and insights with peers in the industry.

Assist in Training Staff on Compliance and Financial Crime Awareness Initiatives

Task: Support the development and delivery of training programs that raise awareness about financial crime and ensure compliance with AML requirements.

Strategies:

Custom training: Tailor training content to different departments, ensuring that staff receive relevant information based on their role (e.g., frontline staff, analysts, or executives).

Case studies: Use real-life examples of financial crime cases to illustrate key risks and red flags in training sessions.

Regular updates: Schedule periodic refreshers and updates as regulations evolve or new threats emerge, keeping the team informed of the latest practices.

Managing Escalations from Junior Analysts

Task: Addressing issues or questions raised by junior analysts when they encounter complex or unfamiliar AML cases.

Strategies:

Establish a clear escalation process: Ensure junior analysts know when and how to escalate cases, and set up an organised workflow for handling these escalations efficiently.

Document resolutions: Keep track of frequently escalated issues and create a knowledge base or playbook that can help reduce future escalations.

Mentorship: Provide coaching and guidance to junior analysts to empower them to handle more complex cases independently over time.

Analysing and Reviewing Junior Analysts' Work

Task: Conduct regular reviews of the work done by junior analysts to ensure accuracy and compliance with AML regulations.

Strategies:

Quality control: Implement a structured review process, including spot checks and formal assessments to ensure work adheres to established standards.

Feedback loops: Offer constructive feedback on both strengths and areas for improvement, fostering continuous learning.

Review templates: Develop checklists or templates that help ensure consistency in how reviews are performed.

Proactively Identifying AML Trends

Task: Monitor emerging trends in money laundering techniques and ensure your team is equipped to address them.

Strategies:

Data analysis: Regularly analyse case data, alerts, and transaction patterns to detect trends that may indicate evolving money laundering tactics.

Industry collaboration: Stay connected with industry news, regulatory updates, and forums to learn about global AML trends.

Team discussions: Conduct brainstorming sessions or training workshops to make your team aware of new trends and encourage proactive identification of unusual patterns.

Requirements

The ideal candidate will possess:

A minimum of 4 years experience in financial crime analysis

In-depth knowledge of financial regulations and compliance standards.

Familiarity with financial crime detection tools and techniques.

Relevant certifications (e.g., ACAMS, ICA) and a degree in finance, business, or a related area are preferred.

Experience in identifying, investigating, and preventing Authorised Push Payment (APP) fraud, with strong understanding of associated typologies and customer impact.

Proven ability to implement and deliver training programmes as well as coach and mentor junior analysts

Experience in performing quality audits and inspections

Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.

Excellent verbal and written communication abilities.

Confidence speaking on the phone to customers and other financial institutions

Hybrid Working

We welcome you to both our UK offices, which are located in Cardiff and London.

We support Working From Home, but we do require you to travel to our offices for training sessions and meetings, which take place fortnightly.

If you live locally to our UK offices, we expect you to attend an office nearest to you on a weekly basis.

Working Pattern

This role operates on a shift basis between 7:00am and 10:00pm, including one weekend per month.

Benefits

What We Offer

At ANNA, we celebrate a flat organisational structure. You might be wondering what that means! Well, it’s all about empowering our team by sharing power and decision-making responsibilities, so everyone can feel a sense of ownership.

Life at ANNA (flexible by design)

Flexible working - focused on trust, autonomy and outcomes

Hybrid or Remote working, depending on role

Work from anywhere for up to 3 months

‍ Support towards home working equipment

Flexible hours for caregiving responsibilities

Temporary reduced hours / phased returns when life needs it

Time off for your child’s first day of school (non-negotiable )

Employee Growth Share options - because when ANNA grows, you grow too

Wellbeing (because you’re a human first)

️ Trained Mental Health First Aiders

Perkbox EAP + counselling support

Online GP access & prescription service

️ Bupa private medical insurance

On-demand wellness content

Menopause support (policy + practical adjustments that actually help)

Financial Wellbeing (money matters - we’re ANNA after all)

Salary sacrifice pension contributions

Workplace nursery salary sacrifice

️ Perkbox discounts & reward points

Cycle to Work scheme

Salary sacrifice for Home & Tech

Growth & Self-Direction (invest in you)

️ £1k annual personal travel allowance

£1k annual personal learning allowance (including non-work learning - yes, really)

Time Off & Life Moments (the important stuff)

‍ Enhanced parental leave

Adoption leave

Pregnancy loss & compassionate family leave

Emergency dependent leave

Belonging & Connection (we actually like each other)

Monthly team brunches

Regular team-building events

Free drinks & snacks in the office

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A quick note on applications

We’re expecting a high level of interest in this role, so while we may not be able to respond to every individual question, we’ll keep candidates updated throughout the process and aim to get back to everyone, good or bad.

Staying safe when applying to ANNA

We’ll never ask you for money, bank details, or sensitive personal information during the hiring process.

All communication will come from an official @anna.money email address.

If something doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t - feel free to check with us directly.

Working with recruiters

We don’t accept unsolicited CVs from agencies.

If you’re a recruiter, please don’t send candidates unless we’ve agreed to work together on a specific role.

Equal opportunity

We hire based on ability, potential, and what you can bring to the team - nothing else.

If you need adjustments during the process, just let us know. We’ll work with you.