Senior Legal Counsel - Regulatory Affairs, EMEA

SENIOR LEGAL COUNSEL- REGULATORY AFFAIRS, EMEA / LONDON OR MANCHESTER / PERMANENT / HYBRID / £92,000-£110,000 PLUS BENEFITS

About the Team / Role 

WEX is an innovative payments and technology company looking to forge the way in a rapidly changing environment, with a goal to simplify the business of doing business for our customers, freeing them to spend more time, with less worry, on the things they love. We are on a journey to build consistent world class user experience across our products and services and leverage customer driven innovation across all of our strategic initiatives.

At WEX, we're looking for a commercially minded Senior Legal Counsel – Regulatory, EMEA to join our Global Legal team. In this strategic role, you'll provide expert legal and regulatory guidance across our Corporate Payments and Mobility businesses in EMEA, helping shape business decisions, support innovation and ensure compliance within a fast-paced, international fintech environment. 

Working closely with senior leaders, Compliance, Product, Commercial and Financial Operations teams, you'll play a key role in regulatory horizon scanning, engaging with regulators, advising on new products and market expansion, and influencing business strategy across the EMEA region.

What’s on offer?

• Highly competitive salary between £92,000-£110,000 (dependant on experience)

• Annual company bonus

• 40 hour week – Monday to Friday

• Hybrid working (1-2 days per week in rather our London or Manchester offices)

• Industry leading pension scheme

• Private Medical

• 25 days holiday plus Bank Holidays – with the opportunity to purchase additional holidays

• Life assurance

• Income protection

• Gym Flex membership

• Discounts & perks platform

• Employee wellbeing

How you’ll make an impact 

Part of the WEX Global Legal team - Regulatory and Government Affairs and reporting into the Senior Legal Director, Regulatory Affairs, International, the Senior Legal Counsel - Regulatory, EMEA will provide regulatory legal support for WEX’s regulated entities operating in the EMEA region (including the UK, the EU, Switzerland and the UAE).  With experience in payments and financial services regulation in the EMEA region, the incumbent will be responsible for:

• Regulatory and commercial legal support for WEX’s regulated entities operating in the EMEA region;

• Regulatory horizon monitoring and provision of strategic regulatory legal guidance to WEX’s regulated entities in relation to applicable regulation both current and prospective;

• Strategic regulatory guidance in relation to WEX’s business strategies, initiatives and imperatives in the EMEA region including in relation to WEX entities operating in the Mobility sector as well as in the Corporate Payments sector;

• Engagement with regulators, industry bodies, lobbyists and external consultants, including external legal counsel;  and

• Engagement with WEX’s compliance team, senior management and board members of the regulated entities and internal business stakeholders.  

• Advising on requirements for and drafting support and guidance in respect of risk frameworks, policies and procedures, intra-group and partner contractual arrangements to ensure operations are compliant with key regulator focus areas such as safeguarding of customer funds, outsourcing, governance, risk management, AML/CTF and financial and operational resilience. 

• Regulatory monitoring, review and management; ensuring WEX is well prepared for regulatory changes including responding to regulatory consultations.

• Identification of legal and regulatory issues associated with operating in new markets.

• Managing license and other applications with regulators including licensing or compliant cross-border service provision efforts in new markets.

• Providing strategic regulatory legal guidance in relation to product development and evolution to support business growth and innovation initiatives.

• Working closely with and supporting the Compliance team in particular but also the Financial Operations, Commercial and Product teams. 

• Assisting with special projects.

Experience you’ll bring

• Qualified to practice Law in England & Wales

• Post qualification experience in payments and financial services law and regulation, ideally with some in an in-house environment

• Located in the UK 

• Strong technical ability and knowledge

• Ideally experience in providing legal services for regulated payments firms, and in particular, experience in provision of regulatory legal guidance and support

• Clear and articulate communicator

• Excellence in flexible problem solving, analysis, and issue resolution

• Ability to work closely with a variety of business stakeholders, networking internally and building confidence

• Experience working with regulators in EMEA would be highly attractive 

What’s next?

If you feel that you have the necessary skills to be our new Senior Legal Counsel  please APPLY TODAY for immediate consideration.

We are an equal opportunities employer and welcome applications from all suitably qualified persons regardless of their race, sex, disability, religion/ belief, sexual orientation, or age

Due to the volume of applications received, unfortunately it is not possible to respond to each one individually, applicants that are shortlisted will be contacted within one week of applications.

We do not accept speculative agency CVs. Any CV received by WEX will be treated as a gift and will not be eligible for an agency fee. PSL agencies should only send CVs if authorised to do so by the Talent Acquisition team.