ATIQUR RAHMAN

Managing Payment Services Division (PSD) comprising of seven Operations Departments/ Units including Conventional & Islamic Treasury Operations, Commercial and Home Remittances, SWIFT & FI Operations, Regulatory Returns, Reconciliations, Business Process Reengineering, User Access Management and Governance/ Controls Management. The division has over 80 staff members. Since the Bank's Head Office is in Lahore, the PSD acts as an extension of Lahore Office and is the Centralized Operations Office in Karachi. Accordingly, my responsibilities extend beyond the usual business and transactional support activities and also include Trade Ops Karachi & Credit Ops Karachi centric Human Resources, Administrative and premises management.

Implemented operational and control improvements to enhance oversight across the division, including:

• New Treasury Management System implementation
• Automated e-PRC and s-PRC to improve process efficiency and accuracy.
• Creation of the Internal Controls Unit to review and monitor control processes across the Division.
• Identifying data backup requirements, establishing policies and processes including provision of hardware/ software resources for data management, administrative and physical assets management.
• Centralised FI Operations to enhance operational efficiency and consistency.
• Overhauled Manuals and SOPs to ensure compliance and operational clarity.
• Enhanced customer engagement and satisfaction through delivery of excellent customer service, achieving service time and quality targets.
• Achieved service time and quality targets.
• Trained and mentored employees, fostering skills development and contributing to overall team performance.

Established and built the department from the ground up for UBL Pakistan and GCC Operations, overseeing a team of over 35 members. The primary responsibility of Payments Screening was to act as 1st line of defense (FLoD) at Bank in relation to the AML/ CFT Sanctions, Name Screening and TBML reviews covering following major business activities:

• Trade Operations (Import, Export, Guarantees, Loans and Forward Contracts) for all stages of the transaction life cycle covering Customers, Banks, Intermediaries, Vessels, Ports, Insurance Companies, Shipping Cos/ Agents, Commodities, Export Control List, HS Code checks, Import/ Export Policy Order checks and Price checks, Vessel Tracking & IMB reports calling.
• Inward/ Outward Remittances including Home Remittances
• Freight Business

I also acted as lead business analyst for UBL's Core Banking and Trade Modules upgrade (system developments) from AML/ CFT, CDD & EDD perspectives for ensuring Financial Crimes Compliance policies implementation.

• Supervising and managing Treasury Foreign Exchange, Derivatives trade and home remittances (HRC) settlement activities with a team of over 20 staff members for UBL Pakistan in local and foreign financial markets with corporate and financial institutional customers through various internal and external financial and stock/ equity market clearing mechanisms including SWIFT, Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS), Central Depository Company (CDC) and National Clearing Co (NCCPL). Since Year 2014, I also supervised Nostro/Vostro, Head Office and Suspense Accounts Reconciliation functions for UBL Pakistan and UBL International Offices at central location in UBL Karachi. List of significant activities managed include:
• Settlement of Foreign Exchange and Derivatives trades.
• SWIFT messaging management, Foreign Exchange Exposure Position (FEE) preparation including Net Open Position, Foreign Exchange Balance Sheet preparation and Front Office Blotter reconciliation.
• Oversaw handling and accounting of various Treasury products to maintain financial integrity.
• Managing P&L reporting for Treasury including MTM, revaluation and Variance Analysis.
• Preparation and review of Regulatory Reporting/ Returns.
• Statutory and Regulatory body relationship management (including SBP), External and Internal Audits handling.
• Managed standard operating procedures (SOP), service level agreements (SLA), and procedure manuals to ensure operational efficiency.
• Internal Control Planning Manager and Operational Risk Manager for Treasury Operations.
• Having knowledge of & collaborating with Treasury Risk Department for reporting of Dealer & counterparty limits, FCY Open position limit, Currency limits, Stop Loss Limit and out-of-market rates limit report.
• Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCP) Manager for Treasury and managing Treasury BCP/ DR manual document.
• Lead business analyst for the implementation of SIERRA Treasury Banking Application and for implementation of SYMBOLS Core Banking application for Treasury.

• Supervising, managing & ensuring smooth functioning of all Treasury Operation activities relating to Foreign Exchange, Money Market, Debt Market and Capital Market Settlement through various internal and external clearing mechanisms including SWIFT, RTGS, CDC and NCCPL. Administering a team of 6 staff members, other significant activities managed included:
• Settlement of FX interbank, Corporate, Money Market and Capital Market Deals with counterparties.
• Daily FX Exchange Position (FEEL) and NOP preparation for all dealing foreign currencies of bank.
• Daily Money Market position preparation including blotter review and source and utilization report.
• Daily Capital Market position preparation including holdings in Strategic, Held to Maturity and Trading Portfolio.
• Daily Nostro Activity and SBP Current account review and reconciliation.
• Daily Exchange gain/ loss calculation including revaluation on FX, MM & Capital Market Deals.
• Handling accounting of various Treasury investments, products and services including fixed income debt securities like Treasury Bills, Government and Corporate Bonds, Discounted/ Zero Coupon Bonds, Coupon payments, Mutual funds etc.
• Created SWIFT messages to facilitate effective communication of transaction details., handling and checking of relevant details with the underlying contracts
• CDC and NCCPL handling for settlement of Equity/ Shares Deals including those in Ready and Futures.
• Risk management and limits monitoring including counter-party limits, investment portfolio limits, exposure limits, trading limits, stop loss, out of market limits and reporting to management for breaches and deviations therein.
• (presently Bank Islami Pakistan)

• Supervising, Managing & Conducting Compliance Audit activities of the Bank in Southern Region covering Sindh & Baluchistan Provinces with emphasis on KYC & AML practices.
• Compiling and presenting the findings of country wide Compliance Audits to the Country Head Compliance Division.
• Continuous reviews of the prevailing applicable laws and regulations.
• Advising through bank wide circulars the procedural aspects of any regulatory and internal policy changes to various segments at Head Office and throughout Bank Branches network.
• Conducted detailed performance reviews, identifying areas for improvement and driving team excellence.
• Monitored compliance with agreed management systems, enabling prompt identification and remedy of risk factors.

• Served as Chief Internal Auditor for ARY Communications (Private) Limited and ARY Cash & Carry (Private) Limited, overseeing income tax, sales tax, corporate secretarial matters and periodic financial budgets.
• Analysed internal controls, recommending improvements for enhanced efficiency.
• Developed audit plans and schedules in line with organisational priorities.

• Worked as Audit Supervisory Senior in KPMG Pakistan (KPMG – Taseer Hadi & Co., Chartered Accountants) and completed four-year mandatory audit training period in October 2001 under the Chartered Accountants Bye-Laws in Pakistan. During my association with KPMG, I also worked at KPMG Dubai in United Arab Emirates.
• Areas of external and special audits (Sales Tax, Cost Account) and assurance assignments undertaken include; Banking, Financial Institutions, Modaraba, Leasing, Insurance, Trading, Manufacturing and Airline.