Banking Roles & Teams
Overview
A bank is made up of many specialised teams. Understanding who does what helps you collaborate effectively, know who to escalate to, and understand where you fit in the payments ecosystem.
Three Lines of Defence
Banks are organised around the Three Lines of Defence model — a governance framework that defines accountability for risk:
┌───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 1st LINE: Business & Operations │
│ (They own and manage risk day-to-day) │
│ ├── Payments Operations │
│ ├── Retail Banking │
│ ├── Transaction Banking │
│ └── Technology / Product teams │
├──────────────────────────────────────────── ───────────────────────┤
│ 2nd LINE: Risk & Compliance │
│ (They set the rules and independently oversee 1st line) │
│ ├── Compliance (AML, sanctions, regulatory) │
│ ├── Financial Crime │
│ ├── Operational Risk │
│ └── Legal │
├───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ 3rd LINE: Internal Audit │
│ (Independent assurance — audits 1st and 2nd lines) │
│ └── Internal Audit │
└──────────────────── ───────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Payments-Specific Teams
Payments Operations
The team responsible for the day-to-day running of payment processing:
| Sub-team | Responsibilities |
|---|---|
| Payment Processing | Monitor STP rates, handle exceptions |
| Investigations | Resolve unmatched payments, customer complaints |
| Nostro Reconciliation | Match correspondent account balances |
| SWIFT Operations | Manage SWIFT connectivity, gpi tracking |
| Scheme Operations | Manage NPP/BECS/RTGS submissions and monitoring |
You'll work with Payments Ops when:
- Your code produces payment exceptions (ops resolves them)
- Building new exception management workflows
- Investigating production incidents involving payments
Transaction Banking / Cash Management
Serves corporate and institutional clients:
| Role | Responsibilities |
|---|---|
| Transaction Banker | Client-facing; structures cash management solutions |
| Product Manager (Cash) | Owns payment product (e.g., Osko for business) |
| Implementation Manager | Onboards corporates to host-to-host file delivery |
| Client Services | Handles corporate client enquiries |
Technology / Engineering
Within the technology division:
| Role | Focus Area |
|---|---|
| Payments Engineer | Builds and maintains payment processing systems |
| Core Banking Engineer | Works on CBS (T24, Finacle, etc.) |
| Integration Engineer | Connects channels, CBS, networks (APIs, MQ) |
| Data Engineer | Payment data pipelines, reconciliation, reporting |
| Platform/SRE | Reliability, uptime, incident response |
| Security Engineer | Encryption, HSMs, API security |
| Test Engineer / QA | End-to-end payment testing, regression |
Product
| Role | Focus |
|---|---|
| Product Owner (Payments) | Backlog, user stories, prioritisation |
| Product Manager | Strategy, scheme submissions, roadmap |
| Business Analyst | Requirements, process mapping, gap analysis |
Compliance & Financial Crime
| Role | Responsibilities |
|---|---|
| AML Analyst | Reviews transaction monitoring alerts |
| Sanctions Analyst | Reviews sanctions screening hits |
| Financial Crime Investigator | Deep-dive fraud and AML investigations |
| Compliance Manager | Policy ownership, regulatory change management |
| MLRO (Money Laundering Reporting Officer) | Statutory role; signs off on SMR filings |
Treasury
| Role | Responsibilities |
|---|---|
| Treasury Dealer | FX trading, money market, liquidity management |
| Liquidity Manager | ESA/nostro balance management, intraday liquidity |
| ALM (Asset/Liability Management) | Balance sheet management |
| Treasury Operations | Trade confirmation, settlement instructions |
Risk
| Role | Responsibilities |
|---|---|
| Operational Risk Manager | Identifies and monitors operational risks in payments |
| Market Risk | FX and interest rate risk |
| Credit Risk | Counterparty and customer credit exposure |
| Fraud Risk Analyst | Models and rules for fraud detection |
Escalation Paths in Payments
Know who to contact for common situations:
| Situation | Who to Contact |
|---|---|
| Payment stuck in processing | Payments Operations |
| Sanctions alert on a payment | Compliance Analyst (2nd Line) |
| Fraud suspicion on a customer | Fraud team (1st Line) |
| NPP/BECS network outage | Scheme Operations + Technology |
| Corporate client complaint | Client Services / Transaction Banking |
| Regulatory question | Compliance |
| Production system down | On-call engineer → Platform/SRE |
| Large financial loss event | Operational Risk + Senior Management |
| Media/public incident | Communications + Risk |
Key Acronyms Used in Banking Teams
| Acronym | Full Form | Context |
|---|---|---|
| COO | Chief Operating Officer | Heads operations |
| CRO | Chief Risk Officer | Heads risk function |
| CISO | Chief Information Security Officer | Heads cybersecurity |
| CTO | Chief Technology Officer | Heads technology |
| MLRO | Money Laundering Reporting Officer | AML compliance |
| SME | Subject Matter Expert | Domain expert on a topic |
| BAU | Business As Usual | Day-to-day operational work |
| SLA | Service Level Agreement | Target response/resolution times |
| RCA | Root Cause Analysis | Post-incident investigation |
| P&L | Profit and Loss | Financial performance |
| RTB/CTB | Run The Bank / Change The Bank | Ops vs project/change work |
| MVP | Minimum Viable Product | Smallest releasable feature |
| UAT | User Acceptance Testing | Business testing before go-live |
Working in an Agile Payment Team
Most payment technology teams operate with:
2-week sprints
├── Sprint Planning — Team selects work from backlog
├── Daily Standup — 15-min sync (what did I do, what will I do, blockers)
├── Sprint Review — Demo completed work to stakeholders
└── Retrospective — What went well, what to improve
Common artefacts:
├── User Story — "As a payments operator, I want to see exception details..."
├── Acceptance Criteria — "Given X, When Y, Then Z"
├── Definition of Done — Code reviewed, tested, deployed to staging
└── Epic — Group of related stories (e.g., "NPP PayTo Integration")
Related Concepts
- payment_lifecycle_101.md — What the team is building/supporting
- payment_exceptions.md — What ops teams handle daily
- aml_kyc.md — What compliance teams enforce
- testing_banking.md — What QA/test engineers do in payments