Payments Liquidity and Settlement Control CFO — Interim

The mandate

Settlement liquidity is being interpreted through balances that mix unrestricted cash with amounts owed to merchants or counterparties. Finance needs an executive who can establish what is genuinely available and what represents an obligation. The interim CFO will restore settlement and liquidity decisions without assuming that processed payment value is revenue or that a positive bank balance removes funding risk.

The twelve-month appointment commences on 19 October 2026, requiring five days weekly from Mumbai and agreed banking and operating sessions. A permanent CFO search remains active. Early work must reconcile settlement calendars, restricted balances and merchant obligations, then determine which exceptions threaten reporting reliability or the ability to meet a time-bound payment commitment.

Handover requires an obligation-led liquidity forecast, reconciled settlement exposures and finance controls whose owners can explain both normal and failed settlement scenarios. The successor must chair a liquidity review and resolve a representative merchant-balance exception. Completing a funding transaction is not required for closure; preserving dependable financial judgement and transferring executive responsibility are.

The CFO may reject unsupported finance entries, set liquidity escalation triggers and approve ordinary payments up to ₹25 lakh within the existing delegation. New facilities, changes to safeguarding arrangements and commitments beyond delegated limits require chief executive or committee approval. Payment operations retain transaction execution, while legal and risk owners retain interpretations and regulatory acceptance beyond finance's remit.

A new payment-product launch, merchant acquisition strategy and wholesale core-system replacement are excluded. The sponsor provides authorised settlement records, banking evidence, contracts and named operational owners. The role needs proven CFO authority and technical payments-finance judgement, including the ability to explain why commercially appealing growth may increase liquidity needs rather than improve cash resilience.

What you will own

• Decide the definition of usable liquidity from authorised banking and obligation evidence, rejecting cash views that count merchant or restricted balances as ordinary funding capacity.
• Establish the settlement exposure register with counterparty, timing and exception ownership, reconciling movements before they inform treasury or management reporting choices.
• Set delegated payment and finance-entry approvals that retain contractual support, escalating obligations that exceed the ₹25 lakh operational payment threshold or require policy judgement.
• Rebuild cash scenarios around failed, delayed and corrected settlements, distinguishing temporary timing pressure from an unresolved structural financing requirement, with a retained written approval basis.
• Direct commercial-finance reviews of merchant and infrastructure contracts, identifying where pricing or settlement terms create exposure not apparent in processed-volume metrics.
• Chair weekly liquidity decisions with operations and risk owners, preserving their execution and regulatory powers while ensuring the finance consequence receives an accountable conclusion.
• Transfer the obligation bridge, finance approvals and residual exposures to the permanent CFO through observed live decisions and signed handover acceptance.

Candidate qualifications

• Demonstrate CFO or equivalent executive finance authority in payments, fintech or merchant infrastructure. Explain a settlement or safeguarding-related financial judgement you personally approved, the contractual and banking evidence used and the specialist authority consulted where finance could not decide alone.
• Show liquidity competence that separates available cash from amounts held for others. Candidates should describe a forecast that changed when obligations were correctly classified and the executive action taken without presenting gross payment volume as financial resilience.
• Evidence commercial-contract judgement in ATM, POS or comparable payment infrastructure. Provide a clause or settlement arrangement that created unexpected cash or margin exposure and explain how finance made its consequence usable for the authorised commercial owner.
• Demonstrate leadership through control exceptions and reporting deadlines, including prioritising finance capacity and maintaining a clear delegation. Explain a settlement-liquidity decision you personally authorised, the merchant obligations excluded from usable funds and the financing or risk exception that still required another executive's consent.
• Provide proof of a durable executive transfer and professional accounting capability. Show how a successor could reproduce an obligation judgement, which unresolved exposures remained visible and how confidential payment records were handled without releasing unnecessary merchant or customer information.

Application

Applications for this mandate are received in one way only: through the India Board Terminal's application process. It is automated end to end. Your Executive Passport travels to the mandate holder in its confidential form, your answers to the three questions below are read before anything else in your file, and every stage that follows is recorded on your applications page.

There is no address to write to and no intermediary to call. The mandate holder reads what the Terminal delivers and nothing else, which is what keeps the process the same for every applicant and keeps your name out of it until you release it. Applications close on 13 October 2026. Mandate reference PCT-INT-2026-IND-11.