Settlements - Lead Associate Sme

The Lead Associate (SME) has a profound and extensive knowledge within the settlements team. Their primary focus is to share their knowledge with the team to achieve efficient settlement processes, high levels of automation, minimise risks to the firm and ensure both internal and external clients experience timely and accurate settlement.

**Key Responsibilities**
- Lead and oversee the Fund Settlement process, ensuring efficient and accurate completion of all transactions within agreed timelines.
- Actively review and monitor STP rates, identifying opportunities to improve automation and reduce manual interventions in the settlement process.
- Manage Fund Data oversight, ensuring that all fund-related information is accurate, up to date, and in line with regulatory requirements.
- Act as a key point of contact for internal stakeholders and external partners regarding Fund Settlements and related queries.
- Monitor and manage settlement exceptions, resolving any issues promptly and ensuring mínimal disruption to operations.
- Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including Risk, Compliance, and Operations, to ensure alignment and adherence to regulatory standards.
- Support process improvement initiatives, identifying opportunities to enhance efficiency, reduce risks, and improve client service, with a focus on improving STP rates and overall operational performance.
- Ensure that the team adheres to all relevant regulations, industry standards, and company policies related to fund settlements.
- Provide mentorship and training to junior team members, fostering a culture of continuous learning and development.
- Ensure all daily & periodic tasks are completed, including the investigation and resolution of reconciliation discrepancies.

**Required Skills & Experience**
- Extensive experience in Fund Settlements, Fund Dealing, and Fund Management within the financial services industry, particularly in a UK regulated environment.
- Strong knowledge of UK financial market regulations and compliance requirements related to fund settlements.
- Demonstrated experience in actively reviewing and optimising STP rates to enhance processing efficiency.
- Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to navigate complex situations and resolve issues efficiently.
- Strong communication skills, both written and verbal, with the ability to engage effectively with stakeholders at all levels.
- Ability to work under pressure, meet deadlines, and manage multiple priorities.
- A high level of attention to detail and commitment to maintaining the integrity of fund data and settlement processes.
- Relevant industry qualifications (e.g., CISI, IOC, or equivalent).

**Benefits**
- Competitive salary plus discretionary annual bonus & annual pay review
- Work Abroad Policy for up to 15 days per year
- 25 days holiday plus bank holidays and additional well-being day
- Option to purchase an additional 5 days holiday per year
- Flexible working options available, including hybrid working
- Pension scheme up to 10% employer contribution
- Sharesave scheme
- Income Protection & Life insurance (4 x salary core level of cover)
- Private health care via BUPA
- Employee Assistance Programme
- Discounted Gym Membership
- Variety of travel to work schemes

Company benefits are provided on completion of either six months service, or a successful probation period whichever is sooner.

Entitlement outlined above is in respect of full-time entitlement, and will be provided to part-time workers on a prorate basis in accordance with the relevant scheme rules.

**_ We appreciate that from time to time, recruitment agencies will have speculative CVs that they may wish to submit to our Talent Acquisition team in relation to a specific role._**

**_ To avoid any ambiguity around fees, please note that speculative CVs received by Close Brothers, that have not been authorised in advance, by us, will be ineligible for an agency fee. Thank you._**

Winterflood Business Services (WBS) is a business to business (B2B) platform provider whose award-winning service has seen us grow to over £15bn AUA with an expanding client list. Our highly skilled and experienced team is dedicated to providing the standards our clients rightly demand.

Our aim is to help solve client problems and ease their regulatory and administrative burden with secure, integrated, and bespoke end-to-end solutions to achieve their investment objectives. Execution quality and excellent service are at the core of our business, all set out in our service level agreements for full transparency.

The WBS service is provided through our EOS platform, which is a proprietary system developed by our in-house development team. EOS is built using the latest technologies and is based on micro-service architecture, making the platform easy to scale and deploy new functionality. We are also market innovators, capable of recognising unfilled needs and developing products to suit our