Senior Manager, Merchant Services

IHG Hotels & Resorts; Atlanta (GA); Hybrid; USD 150,000 - 190,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hotel room discounts

Wellbeing program

Volunteer days

Job summary

IHG Hotels & Resorts seeks a strategic leader to oversee the commercial, financial, and strategic management of its payments portfolio. You will own complex negotiations with card schemes, acquirers, PSPs, and gateways, and translate terms into P&L and economics impacts while coordinating across Finance, Technology, Product, Procurement, Legal, and Commercial teams.

You will optimize routing, pricing, and provider models, build robust financial models, and ensure implementation of negotiated

Qualifications

• Experience leading complex payment negotiations.
• Experience with acquiring, interchange, scheme economics, gateway models, PSPs.
• Track record delivering measurable savings and improved payment performance.
• Experience collaborating with Finance, Technology, Product, Procurement, Legal, and Commercial stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end strategy and execution for complex negotiations with card schemes, acquirers, PSPs, and gateways.
• Translate payment contract terms into P&L, margin, cash, and unit economics impacts; build financial models.
• Actively optimize the payments portfolio across routing, pricing, providers, and operating models.
• Use data to improve authorization rates, chargebacks, pricing consistency, provider accountability.
• Own the payments control agenda across fraud, PCI, scheme rules, disputes, and chargebacks.

Skills

Payment negotiations

Payments ecosystem

Cross-functional collaboration

Financial modeling

Stakeholder alignment

Job description

This role will lead the commercial, financial, and strategic management of the payments portfolio. Own complex provider negotiations, optimize payment economics and performance, strengthen risk and control, and ensure negotiated value is implemented and measured. Partner across Finance, Technology, Product, Procurement, Legal, and Commercial teams to shape future payments strategy and deliver sustainable business outcomes.

Your day to day

• Own end-to-end strategy and execution for complex negotiations with card schemes, acquirers, payment service providers, and gateways, including deal structure, pricing, incentives, service levels, and commercial terms.
• Translate payment contract terms and provider proposals into P&L, margin, cash, and unit economics impacts; build robust financial models that clarify revenue, cost, and risk trade-offs.
• Actively optimize the payments portfolio across routing, pricing, providers, and operating models; identify and close fee leakage and performance gaps.
• Use hotel-level and portfolio data to improve authorization rates, chargebacks, pricing consistency, service performance, and provider accountability.
• Own the payments control agenda across fraud, PCI, scheme rules, disputes, and chargebacks while balancing control, guest experience, and cost.
• Establish clear governance, decision rights, RACI, and escalation paths across a multi-owner environment without slowing delivery.
• Align Finance, Technology, Product, Procurement, Legal, and Commercial stakeholders behind a single negotiation and implementation strategy.
• Ensure negotiated outcomes are implemented, tracked, and realized, including rates, routing changes, incentives, SLAs, savings, and performance improvements.
• Reset standards and build capability in underperforming environments; foster a challenger culture that tests provider and internal assumptions when economics do not stack up.

What We Need From

• Demonstrated success leading complex payment negotiations and owning deal strategy end-to-end.
• Deep payments ecosystem experience across acquiring, interchange, scheme economics, gateway models, PSPs, and provider operating models.
• Proven record of delivering measurable savings, improved commercial terms, and payment performance improvement.
• Experience operating across Finance, Technology, Product, Procurement, Legal, Commercial, and external provider stakeholders.
• Experience resetting standards, improving an underperforming environment, and building team or organizational capability.

Travel - Minimal Required

Location - Our hybrid work structure is an expectation of three (3) days a week in the ATLANTA office. This expectation may be adjusted to evolve with the changing needs of the business.

At IHG Hotels & Resorts, we work together to deliver True Hospitality for Good on a global scale. With corporate offices and over 6,000 hotel destinations worldwide, a career at IHG is the perfect way to broaden your horizons. You’ll experience our unique culture and brilliant colleagues who will support and inspire you. With a host of corporate opportunities to choose from, wherever you are on your career journey, and whatever you want to achieve there’s Room for You at IHG.

Over recent years, we’ve transformed our company. We have bold ambitions to drive performance and maintain our relentless focus on growth in order to be the hotel company of choice that guests & owners love.

We are a hospitality business at our core and value connections and being together helps us foster a unique sense of belonging that also supports productivity. That’s why here at IHG, we give our colleagues flexibility and balance – working in a hybrid way, blending office and remote working collectively. We recognise that every role is different, that’s why leaders work with teams to determine how and when they collaborate.

We provide a wide range of benefits designed to help you live your best work life. These include impressive room discounts across our many properties, recharge days and volunteering days throughout the year. Through our myWellbeing framework, we are committed to supporting wellbeing in your health, lifestyle, and workplace. We offer a unique and inclusive culture, where there is always Room for You to belong, grow and make a difference.

Our mission is to welcome everyone and create inclusive teams where we celebrate difference and encourage colleagues to bring their whole selves to work. IHG Hotels & Resorts provides equal employment opportunities to applicants and employees without regards to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other category protected by applicable laws. We promote a culture of trust, support, and acceptance. Always welcoming different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives.

Important information

• The salary range listed is the lowest to highest pay scale we, in good faith, believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. We may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range, and the range may be modified in the future. An employee’s pay position within the pay range will be based on several factors, including relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, seniority, geographic location, performance, shift, travel requirements, sales or revenue-based metrics, and business or organizational needs.
• No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until it is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, or other form of compensation allocable to a particular employee remain in the Company's sole discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole discretion, consistent with the law.
• If you require reasonable accommodation during the application process, please click here.
• If you are a resident of or applying to a job opening in the State of Washington, please click here to read about applicable benefits.
• For roles or applicants in San Francisco only: Pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, we will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.