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How to Hire a Fraud and Payments Risk Manager for a Fintech

How to Hire a Fraud and Payments Risk Manager for a Fintech

Hirexel Blog cover: How to Hire a Fraud and Payments Risk Manager for a Fintech
Last updated: 11 November 2026

Key takeaways

  • Fraud prevention, payments risk and AML overlap but need different skills; decide which one the role owns.
  • Test the rules engines and tools the candidate used, chargeback experience and how they balanced conversion against fraud loss.
  • Since 7 October 2024, UK PSPs must reimburse in-scope APP scam victims up to £85,000 per claim, which ties fraud prevention to the firm's own losses.
  • Strong customer authentication exemptions depend on fraud rates staying below reference rates, such as 0.13% for remote card payments up to EUR 100.
  • Red flags: only rule maintenance and no ownership of outcomes.
If you need to hire a fraud risk manager fintech teams can rely on, start by deciding what the person will own. "Fraud" in a payments or fintech business covers several jobs: stopping fraudsters, managing chargebacks and payment provider rules, and working with AML on suspicious activity. A candidate who is excellent at one may be weak at the others.
This guide is for founders, COOs and heads of risk at payment institutions, EMIs, neobanks, crypto firms and other fintechs. It covers the differences between the roles, what to test, the regulation that shapes the job and the red flags.

Fraud, payments risk and AML: three different jobs

Fraud prevention Payments risk AML
Main question Is this a fraudster or a genuine customer? Is this payment flow creating losses or breaking provider rules? Is this money laundering or terrorist financing?
Typical cases Account takeover, stolen cards, scams, synthetic identities Chargebacks, merchant risk, refunds, provider and scheme rules Suspicious patterns, sanctions, source of funds
Main tools Rules engines, device and behaviour signals, case management Chargeback tools, merchant monitoring, provider reports Transaction monitoring, screening, case management
Main outcome Fraud losses and customer friction Chargeback rates, provider relationships Reports to authorities, regulatory compliance
Many fintechs combine fraud and payments risk in one role at first. AML usually sits with the MLRO and compliance, with close cooperation. For the AML side, see How to Hire an MLRO for a Crypto or Fintech Company.

What to test

Rules engines and tools. Ask which tools the candidate used, which rules they wrote, and how they tested and tuned them. Ask for an example of a rule they removed because it blocked too many genuine customers.
Chargebacks. Ask how they monitored chargebacks, which causes they found and what they changed, from rules to product to customer communication.
Conversion against fraud loss. The core judgement in the role. Every rule that blocks fraud also blocks some genuine customers. Ask how they measured that trade-off and how they agreed it with product and commercial teams.
Ownership of outcomes. Ask which numbers they were accountable for: fraud losses, chargeback rate, false positives, manual review rate. A candidate who owned outcomes talks differently from one who maintained rules.

The regulation that shapes the job

Reimbursement of scam victims (UK). Under rules set by the Payment Systems Regulator, payment service providers in the Faster Payments system must reimburse in-scope victims of authorised push payment (APP) scams for payments made on or after 7 October 2024. The maximum reimbursement is £85,000 per claim. In-scope customers are consumers, micro-enterprises and charities. For a fintech, that turns scam prevention into a direct cost: every scam the firm fails to stop can become a reimbursement.
Strong customer authentication (EU). The regulatory technical standards on strong customer authentication, Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2018/389, allow a transaction risk analysis exemption only if the payment service provider's fraud rate stays at or below reference rates. For remote card payments these are 0.13% for transactions up to EUR 100, 0.06% up to EUR 250 and 0.01% up to EUR 500. A fraud manager who keeps fraud rates low can therefore also reduce friction for customers.
Ask candidates which rules they worked under and how those rules changed their work. Good candidates connect regulation to their daily decisions. Regulation also changes, so look for someone who follows consultations and adapts controls before the deadline, not after.

Hiring a fraud or payments risk lead?

Send us the job description and your payment flows, and we will look for candidates who have owned fraud outcomes in a similar business.

Interview questions that work

Scenario questions show how the candidate thinks under pressure and with trade-offs:
  • "Account takeover attempts double overnight. What do you check first, which rules do you change, and how do you know the change worked?"
  • "Commercial wants to remove a verification step because it hurts conversion. How do you decide, and what data do you bring to the discussion?"
  • "Chargebacks from one merchant segment rise for three months in a row. Walk me through your investigation."
  • "A customer says they were tricked into sending money to a scammer. What happens in the first 24 hours, and who is involved?"
  • "Which rule did you remove most recently, and why?"
Strong answers combine data, decisions and people: what they would look at, what they would change, who they would involve and how they would measure the effect. Weak answers describe tools without decisions.
Ask for a short written exercise if the role is senior: for example, a one-page proposal to cut fraud losses on a product you describe, with the expected effect on conversion. It shows how the candidate frames trade-offs for management.

Red flags when you hire a fraud risk manager in fintech

  • Only rule maintenance. Kept someone else's rules running, never designed or retired them.
  • No ownership of outcomes. Cannot say which numbers they were accountable for.
  • Fraud at any cost. No view on false positives and the cost to genuine customers.
  • Cannot explain decisions. Does not know why a rule exists or what data supports it.

Where the role sits

Fraud and payments risk often sits between operations, product and compliance. Decide who the manager reports to and how disagreements are resolved, for example when commercial teams want fewer checks. In crypto firms, the role overlaps with withdrawals and wallet operations; see Head of Operations in a Crypto Company: Profile and Hiring Process. In iGaming, it sits inside the payments team; see Building a Payments Team for an iGaming Operator.

How to measure the role

Agree a small set of measures before the person starts and review them together:
  • Fraud losses as a share of volume.
  • Chargeback rate.
  • False positive rate or manual review rate.
  • Approval or conversion rate.
Improving one measure at the expense of the others is not success. A good fraud manager shows the trade-offs openly and agrees them with management.

What we recommend

  1. Decide whether the role covers fraud, payments risk or both, and how it works with AML.
  2. Test tools and rules with examples of rules the candidate wrote and retired.
  3. Make the conversion against fraud loss trade-off a central interview topic.
  4. Ask which outcomes the candidate owned, and check them with references.
  5. Agree measures and reporting lines before the start date.

FAQ

What is the difference between fraud prevention, payments risk and AML?

Fraud prevention protects the firm and its customers from losses caused by fraudsters, such as account takeover or stolen card use. Payments risk covers the risks of the payment flows themselves, such as chargebacks, merchant risk and provider rules. AML covers money laundering and terrorist financing and the legal reporting duties around them. The skills overlap but are not the same.

What should a fintech fraud risk manager know?

They should know the rules engines and fraud tools they have used and how they tuned them, how to manage chargebacks, and how to balance conversion against fraud loss. They should also know the regulation that affects fraud in their markets, such as strong customer authentication and reimbursement rules.

How does regulation affect fraud roles in the UK?

Since 7 October 2024, UK payment service providers in the Faster Payments system must reimburse in-scope victims of authorised push payment (APP) scams, up to a maximum of £85,000 per claim, under rules set by the Payment Systems Regulator. That makes fraud prevention directly linked to the firm's own losses.

What are the strong customer authentication fraud rate thresholds?

Under the RTS on strong customer authentication, Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2018/389, a payment service provider can use the transaction risk analysis exemption for remote card payments only if its fraud rate is at or below reference rates of 0.13% for transactions up to EUR 100, 0.06% up to EUR 250 and 0.01% up to EUR 500.

What are red flags when hiring a fraud risk manager?

Experience limited to maintaining rules someone else designed, no ownership of fraud loss or chargeback outcomes, and no view on the cost of false positives for genuine customers. Another red flag is a candidate who cannot explain why a rule was added or removed.

How do I measure a fraud risk manager?

Agree a small set of measures, such as fraud losses as a share of volume, chargeback rate, false positive rate or manual review rate, and approval or conversion rate, and review them together. Improving one at the expense of the others is not success.

The bottom line

When you hire a fraud risk manager fintech customers will trust, look for someone who owns outcomes, balances conversion against fraud loss and understands how regulation such as APP reimbursement and SCA exemptions turns fraud into a direct business cost. Hirexel recruits fraud, payments risk and AML specialists for fintech, crypto and iGaming companies.

Need someone who owns fraud outcomes, not just rules?

Book a call to define the scope and the skills to test.

Sources

  1. Payment Systems Regulator, PS24/7: APP scams reimbursement, confirming the maximum level: https://www.psr.org.uk/ps24-7-app-scams-reimbursement-confirming-max-level/
  2. Payment Systems Regulator, APP fraud reimbursement protections: https://www.psr.org.uk/information-for-consumers/app-fraud-reimbursement-protections
  3. Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2018/389, Annex (reference fraud rates), UK legislation.gov.uk copy: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eur/2018/389/annex
  4. Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2018/389, Article 18 (transaction risk analysis): https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eur/2018/389/article/18

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