Head of Payment screening - 00133344

Primary Location: ZA-Gauteng

Job Type: Permanent/Regular

Posting Range: 24 Jan 2014 - 8 Feb 2014

Description

Overall Job Purpose
Manage and control the outflow of work delivered by the Payments department by ensuring that all work is processed within the agreed Service Level Agreements (SLA) and that superior customer service is delivered at all times to clients. 

Key Accountabilities

Accountability: Operations Management

• Translate and implement the Group Payments strategy into actionable operational plans and monitor these actions through meetings with Team Leaders/Managers.
• Provide regular feedback to the Head of Payments Operations on the progress and performance against plans.
• Liaise with product house (e.g. Corporate International Banking) to keep abreast of trends with regard to product processing and administration in all segments and sectors so as to plan resources and skills effectively through analysing month-end reports.
• Regulate the volumes of work to prevent backlogs, manage capacity to keep within agreed turnaround times, to eliminate work pressure and to be able to take general control of the department.
  Sign, update and manage Service Level Agreements (SLA's) with stakeholders/strategic business units (SBU's) that Group Payments Provides a service to (e.g Absa Capital, IBW and RBB).
• Provide input to process engineers, process custodians and process owners when requested on the design and implementation of new processes in the clean payments environment.
• Maintain and regularly review the effectiveness of processes used in the clean payments environment and identify ways for improvement.
• Report all proposals before and during the process through to the Head of Payments Operations.
• Monitor and optimise process hand-offs between Payments and its stakeholders including other departments within Payments Operations.
• Ensure access to systems is continuous and without disruption by monitoring and maintaining access to all systems through SLA agreements with Group IT.
• Manage ad-hoc audit processes and act as key contact for risk management in the clean payments department. Take responsibility to resolve any risk, governance or compliance issues.
• Establish and maintain strong professional relationships with Payments department stakeholders, for example Absa Capital, IBW and RBB Attend industry forums and participate in dialogue and contribute to knowledge and thought in the Payments Operations environment where relevant.

Accountability: Risk Management

• Communicate processes, control requirements and risk management frameworks that have been designed for the area and ensure that they are understood by all members of the team (Managers, Team Leaders and clerical staff).
• For audit findings that have an impact on the area, work with the Head of Payments Operations, Risk Officers and other managers within operations to understand what actions are required to close out findings.
• Implements the required actions.
• During scheduled audits and management assurance reviews, ensure that the information required by the auditors is provided timeously.
• Complete the required compliance and SOX attestations.
• Log all Risk and Loss events as a result of error or fraud highlighted in the department. Follow up with Group Forensics to ensure that the issues are thoroughly investigated and closed or escalated as per policy.
• Monitor compliance training undertaken by team members and ensure that they complete the required training within prescribed timelines.
• Update the Business Continuity Tool regularly.
• Arrange for team members to participate in BCM tests at the required intervals and document test results.
• Work with other managers in the area to implement corrective measures in case of test fails.
• Working with other managers in the department to develop Risk and Control Assessments (RCA's) for the function and update at the required intervals (normally quarterly).
• Complete attestations to testify to the adequacy of controls on request.
• Ensure that all team leaders and members understand the control requirements related to physical and systems access control and information security requirements.
• Collect access cards from employees leaving the department or the bank and send instructions to IT and HR to remove their systems access.
• Elect the Health and Safety Rep, Fire Warden and Evacuation rep for the department.

Accountability: Finance

•  Rigorously monitor expenditure against approved budgets and put measures in place to address variances.
• Continuously identify areas for improved efficiency and reduced cost.
• Check with the team leaders/managers to ensure that all commissions from payments processed are recovered from the Strategic Business Units (SBU's) for each payment transaction.
• Monitor and control all General Ledgers accounts to ensure that the correct transactions are posted to the relevant accounts.

Accountability: Reporting

• Sign off end of day reports to control work flow and check that all items have been actioned and entries (Payment queues) are cleared by the team.
• Minute departmental meetings, best practice (as defined in the industry meetings), changes in Absa policies that have an impact on the operations environment and store on the share drive for ease of reference.
• Provide input into the Team Leaders/Managers operational action plans or strategies and document tactical plans for implementation within the team.
• Update the Payments Dashboard on a daily, weekly and monthly basis to track goal achievement in order to close gaps and apply consequence management (positive or negative).
• Collate operational information from managers, e.g. volumes processed, commissions recovered and provide feedback to the Head of Payments Operations. 

Accountability: People Management

• Manage a team of payment team leaders, consultants and specialists to ensure effective daily operations.
• Determine and analyse development needs for the team and ensure that identified training requirements are budgeted for and executed.
• Establish and maintain a succession plan for the team. Interview and recruit new members of the team, including determining appropriate compensation levels with input from Human Resources.
• Create effective workforce and recruitment demand plans to ensure that current and future business requirements can be met.
• Plans should be revised at least twice a year. Review and update the department's organisation structure and role description on an annual basis to ensure that they are fit for purpose and contain all the accountabilities of each team member.
• Motivate to and obtain approval from the department Head for any additional headcount for the team.
• Approve leave requests for team and create leave plans to ensure adequate coverage.
• Monitor overtime spend to ensure that it is kept to a minimum. Report excessive overtime to the Head of department and create plans to address the issue.
• When required initiate disciplinary processes for team members calling on support from Human Resources when required.
• Resolve grievances raised by team members and escalate only if required.
• Develop a high performing team by embedding formal performance development and informal coaching.
• Encourage frequent knowledge sharing between team members.
• Address poor performance of team members through the formal Performance Accelerator Programme.
• Participate in the creation and implementation of Employee Opinion Survey (EOS) actions for the team in order to address issues raised by employees.
• Provide regular communication and feedback of goal achievement to team members 

Essential/Basic Qualifications

Education and Experience Required

B degree or equivalent NQF level 6 qualification

5 years’ experience in a Payments Operations/ Processing environment

4 years’ experience in a management role within a payments processing environment

3 years’ experience in vendor selection and service level management

Knowledge & Skills:

Understanding of a payment operations environment SLA management skills

Excel intermediate

Basic accounting knowledge

Knowledge of payment streams

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