Robin Abraham

Provide functional oversight and ensure adherence to documented processes for customer initiated payments, inward payments, standing orders, payment investigations, corporate dividend distributions, Exchange traded equities, derivatives, treasury FX and money market deal settlements, and proprietary portfolio.

Manage day-to-day activities and provide guidance to a team of 35 outsourced staff and 5 direct reports within a governance framework
Focus on adherence to business SLA’s, timely booking of transactions, cost reduction through continuous improvements
Professionally address customer issues and ad-hoc business requirements
Daily monitoring of reconciliations, TAT, SLA adherence and payment prioritization
Close interactions with heads of Treasury, Investments, Retail, Wholesale Banking, Financial Institutions, IT, Finance, Operational Risk and Compliance
External interactions include key customers, regulator, correspondents and Vostro relationships
Ensure operational risks involving people, processes and systems are well controlled through adequate maker/checker controls and reconciliations
Conduct periodic Risk Self Assessments and initiate Risk Approvals for new processes
Initiate closure of audit recommendations within agreed time-frames
Periodically review and update Standard Operating Procedures and Service Level Agreements

Key Skills
Knowledge of Compliance and AML regulations
Managing reconciliation variances and Nostro exceptions
Documenting specifications for process improvements, User Acceptance Testing
Knowledge of Accounting Entries related to payments, purchase/sale/revaluation of securities, interest accruals and amortization of premiums/discounts
Booking of corporate actions
Internal and statutory MIS on investment portfolio and payments

Managed a team of 12 staff responsible for processing equities, derivatives, foreign exchange and money market transactions. Managed IPO’s as required
Enforced International Accounting Standards (IAS 39) with respect to the investment portfolio
Supervised the introduction of new investment products sold by the bank
Coordinated the financial reporting effort to Qatar Central Bank in relation to the investment portfolio

Supervised a team of 8 staff with overall responsibility of managing back-office functions supporting the Treasury & Investments division of the bank
Prepared status reports to senior management and the Central Bank on performance of customer and banks investments
Supported both internal & external auditors during routine audits
Set up back office processes and work-flows for various investment products

Routine responsibilities included maintaining accurate records of investments held by customers and the bank, updating the general ledger, reconciling cash and securities positions with overseas custodians and handling customer queries.

SELECTED ACHIEVEMENTS
Business lead and functional expert for implementation of:
Payments system to maximize STP and reduce TAT. Achieved cost savings of 35%.
Treasury system (Reuters Kondor) to automate processes for foreign exchange, money market and derivatives transactions. Achieved 40% TAT reduction.
Brokerage application to automate end-to-end processing of securities traded on local Exchange. Achieved cost savings of over 40%.
IPO application for lead-manager role.
Project/Team lead for:
Implementation of IBAN convention for payments
Outsourcing of Operational functions to external vendor
Back-office applications (Flexcube) for securities trading and mutual funds
Central bank launched payments application for QAR based payments
Implementation of Dividend Payment module