PRINCIPAL CONSULTANT - PAYMENTS

TOSS-EX PR PTE. LTD.; Singapore; On-site; SGD 180,000 - 260,000; Full time

Job summary

IFINITY global seeks a visionary Principal Consultant – Payments & Cards to lead strategy, architectural delivery, and business transformation engagements for major financial institutions, neo-banks, and fintech clients globally.

You will serve as SME in modern payments architecture (ISO 20022, real-time payments, open banking) and card issuing/acquiring platforms, driving enterprise programs and identifying new market opportunities to grow IFINITY’s practice.

Qualifications

• 12+ years of experience in payments, switches, cards, or transaction banking.
• Experience in management consulting, fintechs, or major financial institutions.
• Proven leadership of large advisory teams and complex digital payment projects.
• Strong communication and presentation skills with C-level stakeholders.
• Ability to bridge business strategy with deep technical architectures.

Responsibilities

• Lead end-to-end delivery of strategic advisory and digital transformation programs.
• Advise executives on payment modernization, roadmaps, and operating models.
• Develop opportunities, drive RFPs, and lead technical proposals.
• Collaborate with engineering teams on solution designs and API strategies.

Skills

Stakeholder management

Leadership

Consulting experience

Payments domain expertise

Strategic advisory

Education

Bachelor's degree in CS or related field

Master’s degree / MBA preferred

Tools

ISO 20022

APIs & integration frameworks

Card issuing/acquiring platforms

Real-Time Payments platforms

Job description

1. Executive Summary

IFINITY global is seeking for an experienced, visionary Principal Consultant – Payments & Cards to lead strategy, architectural delivery, and business transformation engagements for major financial institutions, neo-banks, and fintech clients globally. In this role, consultant will sit at the intersection of business strategy, technology modernization, and client relationship management. Consultant will serve as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) in modern payments architecture (ISO 20022, Real-Time Payments, Open Banking, AI assisted payments) and card issuing/acquiring platforms, driving complex enterprise transformation programs while identifying new market opportunities to grow IFINITY’s practice in enterprise payments domain.

2. Key Responsibilities

• Client Engagement & Advisory Leadership: Lead end-to-end delivery of high-impact strategic advisory and digital transformation programs across the payments and card lifecycle. Advise C-suite executives and senior leaders on payment modernization strategies, legacy migration roadmaps (e.g., mainframe to microservices/cloud), Latest ISO version adoptions, and card platform ecosystem redesign. Frame business cases, ROI models, and target operating models for novel payment initiatives (A2A, Embedded Finance, BNPL, Cross-Border).
• Practice Development & Thought Leadership: Mentor and grow senior consultants, lead managers, and solution architects. Define the structure of services teams, certification pathways and assist to seek opportunities to deploy certified team members for exposure. Advise on cross training areas in terms of maximizing resource utilization.
• Business Development & Revenue Growth: Partner with Account Leaders and Business Development executives to originate and qualify new consulting opportunities. Drive RFP responses, pitch presentations, scope definition and technical proposals for complex payments engagements. Expand existing client accounts by identifying unaddressed pain points and proposing targeted solution portfolios.
• Solution Architecture & Governance: Collaborate with enterprise engineering teams to validate solution designs, API strategies, and platform integrations for core payment systems (e.g., ACI, FIS, Fiserv, Finastra, TSYS, Marqeta). Direct business analysis, target operating model (TOM) design, compliance alignment, and risk management frameworks.

3. Core Competencies & Subject Matter Expertise

Domain / Stream

Technical & Functional Expertise

Payment Modernization

• Real-Time Payments (RTP, FedNow, SEPA Instant, UPI), ISO 20022 messaging standards, Cross-Border Payments (SWIFT gpi, Ripple), SWIFT ISO migration, AI assisted payments.

Card Issuing & Acquiring

• Credit, Debit, and Prepaid card lifecycle management; Issuer/Acquirer Processing; Scheme Rules (Visa, Mastercard, Amex); Tokenization (VTS, MDES); EMV standards.

Digital Payments & Open Finance

• Wallets (Apple Pay, Google Pay), Account-to-Account (A2A) Payments, PSD2/PSD3, Open Banking APIs, BNPL integration, Metros payments, Embedded Finance models.

Platform Ecosystems

• Expertise with enterprise payments switches, HSMs, Online payment platforms, Integration platforms, Fraud Management platforms, AI assisted payment platforms.

Regulatory & Security

• PCI-DSS compliance, Strong Customer Authentication (SCA), AML/Sanctions Screening, Fraud/Risk platforms (Featurespace, Feedzai, FICO).

4. Qualifications & Requirements

• Education: Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related business discipline. Master’s degree / MBA strongly preferred.
• Industry Experience: 12+ years of experience in payments, switches, cards, or transaction banking within management consulting, fintechs, or major financial institutions.
• Consulting Track Record: Proven experience leading large-scale advisory teams and delivering complex digital payment transformation projects.
• Stakeholder Management: Exceptional communication and presentation skills with demonstrated success managing C-level client relationships.
• Technical Depth: Ability to bridge high-level business strategy with deep-dive technical architectures, API frameworks, and data models.