Compliance Specialist

Hi, we’re Penfold - We are on a mission to build the pension of the future! 🚀

At Penfold, we’re dragging pensions out of the dark ages with a modern, tech-first platform that makes pensions engaging, accessible, and rewarding.

We’re a growing team across London and Tallinn, backed by top FinTech investors, helping more people and businesses save for their future.

As part of a growing business, you’ll have the opportunity to make a real impact, work across a broad range of compliance and risk topics, and develop quickly as the company grows.

About the role

We’re looking for a Compliance Specialist to join our Risk & Compliance team.

This is a hands-on role for someone with a good grounding in financial services compliance who is ready to work independently across a number of areas.

You’ll own defined compliance processes and workstreams, provide practical day-to-day advice to colleagues, support good customer outcomes and help us identify where our processes, controls and ways of working could be better.

You’ll work across areas including pensions regulation, Consumer Duty, financial crime, complaints, data protection, incidents, regulatory change and assurance.

You’ll have support from more senior members of the team on more complex or unfamiliar issues, but we’ll expect you to take ownership of your work, manage your priorities and know when something needs escalating.

Your responsibilities

• Provide practical and proportionate compliance advice to teams across Penfold, including owning and responding to Risk & Compliance queries raised through Jira.
• Research regulatory questions, form a clear initial view and translate requirements into practical options for the business.
• Own the day-to-day logging and management of incidents, making sure they are properly recorded, investigated and progressed through to resolution.
• Carry out compliance monitoring and assurance reviews across areas such as complaints, financial crime, marketing, pension regulations and GDPR.
• Support regulatory change by assessing the impact on Penfold and helping implement changes to policies, processes and controls.
• Review,  analyse and compile compliance and risk MI, identifying trends and contributing to Risk Committee and other governance reporting.
• Work collaboratively across the business, providing constructive challenge and helping colleagues find compliant ways to deliver at pace.
• Contribute to improvements across the Risk & Compliance function and share knowledge with more junior colleagues.

Skills and experience

• Around 2–3 years’ experience in financial services/pensions compliance or a closely related role.
• Good working knowledge of FCA rules and how regulatory requirements apply in practice.
• Experience providing compliance advice to business teams.
• Experience of compliance monitoring, assurance, incident management, and regulatory change.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities and deliver work without close supervision.
• Good analytical skills and confidence researching regulatory issues.
• Experience within pensions or workplace pensions would be helpful but isn’t essential.
• Knowledge of Consumer Duty, anti-money laundering, data protection and pensions regulation would be beneficial.
• A relevant professional qualification, or willingness to work towards one, would be welcome.

What we’re looking for

• You take ownership of your work and follow things through to completion.
• You’re comfortable working independently within established processes and frameworks.
• You use good judgement on day-to-day issues and know when something needs to be escalated.
• You take a practical approach to compliance and focus on what actually matters rather than getting lost in technical detail.
• You can explain regulatory requirements clearly and simply — no jargon please.
• You’re comfortable challenging colleagues constructively and putting forward your view.
• You can balance regulatory requirements, customer outcomes and business needs on routine matters.
• You’re curious, willing to learn and comfortable working across a broad range of Risk & Compliance topics.
• You look for ways to improve processes rather than simply doing things because they’ve always been done that way.

Ultimately, we’re looking for someone smart, practical and proactive who gets things done and wants to develop.

So, if you’re excited about what we’re doing, get in touch — and definitely don’t be put off if you don’t tick every box!

Our application process

• Phone screen (~30 min)
• Hiring Manager Interview (~1 hour) – an in-depth conversation about your experience, skills and approach to the role.
• Virtual Live Task (~45 min) – to assess how you approach a practical compliance problem and communicate your thinking.
• Culture Interview (~30 min) – you’ll meet other members of the team and find out more about what it’s like working at Penfold.

Benefits

We’re working hard to create a working environment where people feel empowered to do their very best work, make a big impact, and enjoy what they do.

Our benefits package includes:

• A competitive salary; we proactively review salaries to make sure you get what you deserve.
• Meaningful share options, so you’ll own a part of Penfold and share in our success.
• 10% pension contribution each month that you don’t need to match, on top of your salary.
• Medical insurance through Vitality.
• Unlimited holiday — we’re interested in your output, not how many holidays you go on!
• Hybrid working. We like people to come into our London office at least a couple of days a month to collaborate, but trust you to get your work done in the environment that suits you.
• Great community office space near Borough Underground station.
• Free company lunch every week.
• Laptop and any WFH equipment you need.
• Cycle to Work scheme.
• Learning and Professional Development, including regular feedback, courses, events and coaching to support your progression.
• Quarterly company socials and regular meet-ups throughout the year.

We are 100% committed to building a diverse and representative team. Whatever your race, religion, colour, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, or disability - we want to hear from you. If you have questions about the role or the company or the interview process, please let your recruiter know and we’re happy to answer these anonymously if that makes you feel more comfortable. 

We’re all about giving every candidate the best chance to shine. If you require any reasonable adjustments to the job description, application, or selection process, just let us know — we’d be happy to help. When it comes to hiring, we focus only on your skills, experience, and how you live our values.

As part of our hiring process, we may record your interview and use AI tools to generate notes. This helps us capture details accurately and ensures a fair review by our hiring panel. By attending an interview with Penfold, you consent to the use of recording and AI-generated notes for this purpose. If you have any concerns or would prefer not to be recorded, please let us know in advance.

As we’re a regulated business, any offer (and ongoing employment) depends on passing the usual pre-employment and regulatory checks, which are started before your first day.