Financial Crime Specialist - Transaction Monitoring

Our Story

Hello there. We’re Zopa.

We started our journey back in 2005, building the first ever peer-to-peer lending company. Fast forward to 2020 and we launched Zopa Bank. A bank that listens to what our customers don’t like about finance and does the opposite. We’re redefining what it feels like to work in finance. Our vision for a new era of banking puts people front and centre — we’ve built a business that empowers everyone to aim high, every day, to move finance forward. Find out more about our fantastic offerings at Zopa.com!

We’re incredibly proud of our achievements and none of it would be possible without the amazing team here. It’s not just industry awards we’re winning, we’ve also been named in the top three UK’s Most Loved Workplaces.

If you embrace unconventional challenges, are unafraid to think differently and are driven to make an outsized impact, you’ll thrive here at Zopa, so join us, and make it count. Want to see us in action? Follow us on Instagram @zopalife

The role:

As a Financial Crime Specialist, you will protect Zopa and its customers by investigating complex transaction monitoring activity, making clear and well-evidenced decisions, and escalating suspicion appropriately. You will apply sound judgement where automation is not appropriate, ensuring our controls remain effective, proportionate and customer-focused.

This role is central to how we’re evolving financial crime at Zopa. You’ll combine investigative expertise with the assurance of AI-enabled tools, challenging AI outputs, identifying control gaps and helping improve the quality and consistency of decisions across Financial Crime Operations.

Working pattern:

This is a hybrid role, with 3 days per week in the office. You’ll work 7.5-hour shifts between 8am and 8pm, Monday to Friday.

You’ll also work one full weekend every four weeks, working remotely from 9am to 5:30pm, with weekdays off in lieu.

Some bank holiday working will also be required throughout the year, with time off in lieu provided for any bank holidays worked.

A day in the life:

Investigate and make risk-based decisions

• Review and investigate Transaction Monitoring alerts across Zopa products, identifying activity linked to money laundering, fraud, terrorist financing and other relevant financial crime typologies.

• Take ownership of complex cases from investigation through to decision, using contextual analysis, linked-account insights and appropriate risk mitigation.

• Make timely, proportionate and well-evidenced decisions, including account restrictions and escalations where required.

• Escalate suspicious activity in line with internal procedures and relevant legal and regulatory obligations.

Assure AI and strengthen our controls

• Use AI-enabled monitoring tools in your day-to-day casework, critically assessing alerts, summaries and recommendations rather than accepting outputs at face value.

• Assess whether AI-led decisions and customer journeys are delivering the right financial crime and customer outcomes, identifying and escalating quality, risk or control concerns.

• Share insights from investigations to help improve monitoring rules, AI performance, customer questioning and operational controls.

Deliver strong customer and operational outcomes

• Maintain clear, accurate investigation records and rationales, documenting the evidence considered, decisions made and risks mitigated.

• Handle inbound and outbound telephone and chat conversations with professionalism and empathy, including conversations with customers whose accounts have been suspended.

• Collaborate across Financial Crime, Fraud, Customer Support, Product and Risk to progress investigations, resolve issues and improve customer outcomes.

About you:

• Proven experience investigating complex Transaction Monitoring and/or mule activity cases end to end, including making alert decisions and escalating suspicious activity where appropriate.

• A strong interest in technology-led environments, with an understanding of how AI can support day-to-day decision-making and improve outcomes.

• A sound understanding of UK financial crime requirements, including POCA, the Money Laundering Regulations and FCA expectations.

• Strong analytical judgement, with the ability to interpret complex information, identify relevant risks and produce clear, evidence-based rationales.

• Confidence in challenging AI-generated summaries, recommendations and decisions, while taking accountability for the final outcome.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to handle sensitive customer conversations with care and professionalism.

• The ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-paced environment without compromising decision quality or control standards.

• A good understanding of retail banking products, including payments, savings and investment transactions.

Desirable:

• Experience investigating complex Mule activity, linked-account networks and suspicious payment behaviour.

• Experience using AI-enabled tools to support financial crime investigations or operational decisioning.

• ACAMS, ICA or an equivalent financial crime qualification.

At Zopa we value flexible ways of working.

We value face-to-face collaboration and a good work-life balance. This hybrid role requires you to come to our Manchester office 3 days a week. (WeWork, Dalton Place, 29 John Dalton Street, M2 6WF) Please note this office is dog friendly so you might see some furry friends about!

You'll also have the option of working from abroad for up to 120 days a year!* But no matter where you are, we’ll make sure you’ve got everything you need to thrive, both in your work and home life, from day one.

*Subject to having the right to work in the country of choice

Diversity Statement

Zopa is proud to offer a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives, and backgrounds leads to better products for our customers and a unique company culture for our people. We are made up of nearly 50 nationalities, have a DE&I forum made up of Zopians wanting to make a difference and we are proud of our culture where everyone can bring their full self to work. Our approach to DE&I is reflected in our hiring process so please let us know if you require any reasonable adjustments.

Our approach to AI in interviews

At Zopa, AI isn't something we're testing out — it's part of how we work every day. As a proud partner of Jobs 2030, we're committed to building AI fluency across our workforce, and we expect Zopians to use AI as part of how they do their jobs.

Because of that, we want to be transparent about how we think about AI use during our hiring process.

Behavioural and competency-based interviews: please don't use AI. These conversations are designed to understand you — your experiences, your judgment, and how you've approached real situations. An AI-generated answer can't tell us that. What it can do is get in the way of us finding out whether we're the right fit for each other.

Technical interviews: it depends on the role. Some technical stages actively welcome AI use, others don't. Your Talent Partner will let you know what's expected at each stage. Where AI is part of the assessment, we'll be interested not just in the outcome, but in how you used it – the tools you chose, your reasoning, and the decisions you made along the way.

#LI-LH1