Cape Town City Centre: Product Owner – Card Payments & Payment Gateway – Claremont

ENVIRONMENT Our client is a scale-up fintech with a start-up mindset, combining the agility and innovation of a startup with the stability of an established payments business. They are building world-class card payment solutions for South Africa and need a Product Owner with deep card payments expertise to own this critical domain. you will own the card payments domain end-to-end, translating complex banking and scheme requirements into scalable, merchant-ready payment solutions. This is a hands-on role for someone who has implemented payment gateways or card payment solutions before, either within a gateway, fintech, or banking environment. DUTIES Product Ownership & Strategy Own the card payments and payment gateway roadmap, balancing business objectives, regulatory requirements, and technical constraints. Define and prioritise features for online card acceptance, transaction flows, security, and performance. Act as the primary payments SME for stakeholders across Product, Engineering, Risk, Finance, and Operations. Business Analysis & Delivery Analyse and define detailed requirements for new and enhanced card payment functionality. Map and optimise end-to-end card payment flows including authorisation, settlement, reconciliation, 3D Secure, tokenisation, refunds, and chargebacks. Translate business and banking requirements into clear user stories, functional specifications, and acceptance criteria. Support delivery teams across the full SDLC — from discovery and refinement through to UAT and production rollout. Payments & Banking Alignment Ensure solutions comply with South African acquiring requirements, scheme mandates (Visa / Mastercard), PASA rules, and regulatory standards. Collaborate with banks, processors, and third-party providers on integrations and compliance. Partner with merchants and internal teams to explain payment flows, troubleshoot issues, and improve transaction success rates. REQUIREMENTS Must-Have Experience Proven experience working within a payment gateway, fintech, or bank on card payment solutions. Strong understanding of: Card-not-present payment processing Payment gateway integrations Card rails and banking requirements 3D Secure (1 & 2), tokenisation, card vaulting Settlement, reconciliation, refunds, and chargebacks Fraud prevention and transaction risk analysis Experience with API-driven payment platforms and technical integrations. Product & BA Skillset Experience in a Product Owner or Senior BA capacity, owning features or domains. Strong business analysis fundamentals: requirements gathering, process mapping, user stories, and UAT. Comfortable in Agile environments using tools such as Jira, Confluence, Miro, Swagger/OpenAPI. Nice to Have Banking or acquiring experience with direct exposure to card rails. High-volume transaction platform or fintech experience. ATTRIBUTES Strong communicator bridging technical, business, and banking stakeholders. Detail-oriented with a systems-thinking mindset. Confident owning a specialised domain while collaborating within a broader product and BA team. Passionate about building reliable, compliant, and scalable payment experiences.