Chief Risk Officer — Payments Portfolio

The mandate

A payments portfolio is defending margin while network cost, fraud sophistication and merchant expectations rise. Commercial teams are pursuing segments previously outside appetite, operations rely more heavily on partners, and control investment is being challenged for near-term return. The board needs a CRO who can reset risk ownership and show which risks the business is paid to take, which require mitigation and which should be refused.

The role leads approximately 240 employees and material partners across enterprise, merchant, fraud, operational, technology and third-party risk. Its transaction, asset and risk perimeter is around ₹5,350 crore. Compliance and internal audit remain independent peers. The CRO owns risk framework, appetite, challenge, aggregation and board assurance—not commercial decisions disguised as second-line approval.

Margin compression makes good quantification essential. Excessive controls can make legitimate merchants uneconomic, while weak onboarding can import fraud, chargeback and reputational loss that appears later. The executive must connect risk indicators to cohort economics and insist that first-line leaders own the consequences of exceptions.

The portfolio also participates in networks where risk propagates across parties. A merchant may appear acceptable until fulfilment delays create chargebacks; a processor outage may become a liquidity event; an outsourced review team may satisfy productivity targets while missing coordinated fraud. The CRO must use connected scenarios and concentration analysis rather than isolated registers. They will decide where common controls should apply across products and where differentiated authentication or reserves provide the better customer and economic result.

Risk data requires repair as well as interpretation. Fraud, complaints, losses, service incidents and merchant changes currently arrive on different clocks. The executive will establish lineage, thresholds and accountable data owners so the committee can distinguish emerging exposure from reporting noise. Independent validation should target the assumptions most capable of changing appetite, not produce a second version of every management report.

Why this seat is open

This is an urgent replacement following the incumbent’s accelerated departure. Interim committee oversight covers immediate limits but cannot redesign appetite, leadership or the annual assurance plan. The board wants a permanent CRO before expansion into higher-risk merchant categories and renewal of critical outsourced services.

What you will own

• Rewrite risk appetite in measurable terms for merchant acceptance, fraud, settlement, operations, technology and suppliers.
• Establish first-line ownership and prevent recurring exceptions from becoming an informal business model.
• Segment merchant risk using business model, payment flow, fulfilment, concentration and observed behaviour.
• Challenge fraud strategy across prevention, authentication, customer friction, loss and false-positive economics.
• Aggregate operational and technology exposure across common dependencies and severe scenarios.
• Strengthen third-party entry, monitoring, concentration and exit for critical processing and service partners.
• Give the risk committee clear forward indicators and alternative actions rather than retrospective breach counts.
• Build a credible 240-person risk function with specialist depth, succession and appropriate independence.

The first 12 months

The opening 60 days should review appetite breaches, merchant exceptions, fraud cohorts, settlement incidents and supplier dependencies. Test whether reported margin includes the full loss and control cost of recently targeted segments. Clarify any risk decision currently owned only through committee consensus.

By month four, present revised appetite with thresholds, owners and consequences. Recommend whether proposed merchant segments proceed, pause or require different pricing and control. Agree the top remediation portfolio and remove duplicate assurance that consumes effort without changing exposure.

Months five to nine should embed cohort-level risk reviews, exercise a severe fraud or settlement scenario and complete one critical supplier exit test. Strengthen first-line risk teams and use thematic second-line review where evidence shows common causes. Escalation should occur before tolerance is exhausted.

At year end, recurring high-severity exceptions should fall at least 50%; 95% of material merchants should sit within current risk segmentation; fraud loss and false-positive friction should meet approved joint thresholds; all critical suppliers should have tested continuity and actionable exits; and no severe issue should remain beyond its committee-approved date without explicit renewed acceptance.

What the board will measure

• Risk-adjusted contribution of new merchant cohorts and accuracy of expected loss.
• Frequency, age and recurrence of appetite exceptions.
• Fraud loss, customer friction and speed of emerging-pattern response.
• Settlement, operational and technology resilience under exercised scenarios.
• First-line ownership and closure of material remediation.
• Independence, capability and succession of the risk function.

The person

You have 22–28 years in payments, banking, cards or regulated fintech risk and recent CRO or major divisional responsibility. Your accountable perimeter includes at least ₹3,100 crore of transactions, assets or risk and 240 employees and partners.

You have reset appetite when economics were under pressure and can identify a segment you constrained or rejected despite growth appeal. You understand merchant underwriting, fraud, settlement, technology and supplier dependencies well enough to challenge specialists without becoming the first line.

You communicate uncertainty plainly and propose choices. The board values a CRO who can distinguish genuine risk acceptance from delayed remediation and who will hold the same evidence standard with powerful commercial leaders and control colleagues.

Compensation and terms

The fixed range is ₹2.2–3.0 crore with performance variable. Measures include risk-adjusted economics, appetite adherence, fraud, resilience, remediation and function health. The permanent position is onsite in Pune and is being filled urgently.

Confidentiality

The payments organisation and transition will be disclosed only after qualification and confidentiality. All values and events are blended to prevent identification. Suspected client contact is not permitted.