The Payments Risk Manager will lead risk strategy across card, bank transfer and digital payment channels. This role requires a strong background in payments, fraud prevention, regulatory compliance and stakeholder management. The ideal candidate balances analytical rigour with commercial awareness to protect revenue and reputation.
The Payments Risk Manager role focuses on identifying, assessing and mitigating risks across payment products and channels. The post holder will work closely with operations, compliance, product and engineering teams to embed robust controls and responsive monitoring.
Payments Risk Manager Job Profile
The Payments Risk Manager develops and implements risk frameworks covering transaction monitoring, fraud detection and third-party oversight. This role builds procedures, sets risk appetite and ensures regulatory adherence while enabling secure payments growth.
Reporting to the Head of Risk or Chief Risk Officer, the manager will lead cross‑functional initiatives, deliver metrics to senior leadership and act as the escalation point for payment incidents.
Payments Risk Manager Job Description
The Payments Risk Manager is responsible for designing and operating an effective risk management programme across card schemes, account-to-account transfers, and emerging digital wallets. You will analyse transactional data to detect emerging fraud trends and refine rules, thresholds and machine learning models in collaboration with data science colleagues. You will also maintain strong relationships with acquiring banks, card schemes and payment processors to ensure aligned incident response and dispute management.
Key duties include defining risk appetite, creating policies and procedures, and ensuring the business meets regulatory and internal compliance standards. The role requires proactive incident management, including root cause analysis, remediation plans and communication with regulators where necessary. You will prepare and present regular risk reports for executive committees and support audits and independent reviews.
As the Payments Risk Manager, you will champion continuous improvement by leading post‑incident reviews, driving automation of manual controls and implementing effective controls across onboarding, transaction processing and settlement. You will provide coaching to frontline teams on risk awareness and ensure training and documentation remain current.
Payments Risk Manager Duties and Responsibilities
- Develop, maintain and implement payment risk frameworks, policies and procedures.
- Monitor transaction flows and alerts to identify fraud, money laundering or operational issues.
- Design and tune transaction monitoring rules and behavioural models in partnership with data teams.
- Lead incident response for payment failures, fraud events and regulatory enquiries.
- Manage relationships with banks, card schemes, acquirers and payment service providers.
- Perform root cause analysis and drive remediation plans to reduce recurrence.
- Define risk appetite and key risk indicators, producing regular management reporting.
- Oversee vendor and third-party risk assessments related to payment infrastructure.
- Support product teams during launches to embed security and compliance by design.
- Coordinate internal and external audits, and respond to supervisory examinations.
- Deliver training and guidance to operations and customer support teams on risk controls.
Payments Risk Manager Requirements and Qualifications
- Degree in finance, economics, computing or a related discipline, or equivalent experience.
- Proven experience in payments risk, fraud prevention or financial crime roles within financial services or fintech.
- Strong analytical skills with experience in transaction monitoring tools and data interrogation.
- Knowledge of card schemes, ACH/CHAPS/SEPA rails and payment switching.
- Familiarity with regulatory requirements such as PSR, FCA expectations, AML and PSD2.
- Experience working with third-party vendors and conducting vendor risk assessments.
- Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills, able to present to senior leadership.
- Ability to prioritise under pressure and manage multiple investigations simultaneously.
- Professional certifications such as CAMS, CIPP or relevant risk accreditation are advantageous.
- Strong IT literacy and experience collaborating with engineering and data science teams.
