Senior Compliance Officer (AML/Fintech/Payments)

Overview

Senior Compliance Officer (AML/Fintech/Payments) Jobs in City of Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa at Black Pen Recruitment

Title: Senior Compliance Officer (AML/Fintech/Payments)

Company: Black Pen Recruitment

Location: City of Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa

Senior Compliance Officer (AML/Fintech/Payments)

Our client is a high-growth fintech company building the next generation of payment infrastructure across Africa. Their mission is to make money movement seamless, inclusive, and scalable across borders. They operate at the intersection of financial innovation and real-world impact, empowering businesses and consumers with tools to thrive in a rapidly digitising economy.

Role Overview

The Senior Compliance Officer will lead the day-to-day implementation and maintenance of the company’s compliance framework across all business lines, including financial services, crypto asset trading, and payments. The role owns client due diligence (pre- and post-onboarding), transaction monitoring, and investigations, acts as an escalation point for complex compliance matters, and drives regulatory engagement, reporting, and policy development. This is a senior level position with supervisory responsibility, deputising for the CLCO where required, across multiple regulated environments.

Job Type: Full-time | Permanent

Work Place: Onsite

Location: Cape Town

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree or tertiary qualification in Law.
• At least 7 years’ PQE in compliance within financial services, banking and payments environments, including experience operating at a senior or supervisory level.
• Demonstrable experience with payments, cryptocurrency and digital asset regulation.
• Direct experience engaging with regulators and drafting and implementing compliance policies, frameworks and operational processes.
• Experience supervising or reviewing the work of junior compliance staff.
• Strong analytical, investigative, and problem-solving skills.
• Excellent attention to detail and a high standard of accuracy.
• Strong organisational abilities and the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to work both independently and collaboratively within a team.

Responsibilities

Compliance Operations

• Own the day-to-day operation of the company’s compliance framework, ensuring adherence to regulatory requirements and industry standards across all business areas.
• Lead the implementation, maintenance and periodic review of compliance policies and operational procedures, aligning them with evolving regulatory obligations.
• Ensure accurate and up-to-date compliance records and documentation are maintained and oversee the quality of records produced by junior compliance staff.

KYC & Due Diligence

• Oversee Know-Your-Customer (KYC/KYB) checks on new clients and ongoing due diligence reviews on existing clients and counterparties, handling complex or high-risk cases directly.
• Act as final reviewer of KYC documentation during onboarding, ensuring all required checks are completed prior to account activation.
• Directly handle enhanced due diligence (EDD) on high-risk clients and complex structures, including UBO verification and source-of-funds assessment.

Screening & Monitoring

• Oversee the resolution of customer screening alerts (PEPs, sanctions and adverse media), acting as the escalation point for contested or complex matches.
• Oversee transaction monitoring, calibrating rules and thresholds and directing the investigation of suspicious or unusual activity.
• Lead investigations and take responsibility for preparing Suspicious Transaction Reports (STRs) and Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs).

Investigations & Reporting

• Direct investigations into flagged accounts and manage responses to requests and inquiries from banks, counterparties and regulatory authorities.
• Lead collaboration with fraud operations, banking and payment partners to mitigate financial crime risks.
• Own the preparation of internal and external compliance reporting, including management information for senior legal and compliance functions.

Regulatory Awareness & Collaboration

• Track and interpret changes in AML, KYC, financial services, crypto asset and payments regulation across relevant jurisdictions, and translate them into actionable requirements for the business.
• Work closely with senior compliance and legal functions to drive company-wide understanding and application of compliance obligations, including delivering compliance training.
• Take ownership of relationships with payment, banking and regulatory partners. Supervise, coach and review the work of junior compliance staff.

What We Offer

• Mission-Driven Work: The opportunity to work on solving cross-border payments in Africa.
• Connecting us to the world, and the world to us.
• A startup environment with massive growth: High pace, high growth where your work directly shapes and impacts the company.
• Competitive Compensation: A salary package that matches your expertise and the market rate.