Group Head, Payment Control

About the role

The Group Head, Payment Control leads the Group’s payment control function, ensuring that all vendor, contractor, employee, statutory, inter‑company and other approved payments are processed accurately, securely and in line with policies, authority limits and regulatory requirements.

Key responsibilities

• Develop, review and enforce Group‑wide payment control policies, procedures, approval matrices and SOPs.
• Oversee pre‑payment reviews to confirm proper authorisation, supporting documentation, budget availability, tax treatment and vendor validation.
• Validate payment requests against purchase orders, contracts, invoices, goods receipt/service entry confirmations and payment terms before release.
• Provide independent control over payment batches, manual and urgent payments, advances, refunds, statutory remittances and inter‑company settlements.
• Monitor segregation of duties across invoice processing, payment approval, execution, bank release and posting to reduce fraud and error risk.
• Coordinate with Accounts Payable, Treasury, Procurement, Tax, Internal Audit, Legal and Operations to resolve exceptions and control gaps.
• Approve or recommend payment releases within delegated authority and escalate high‑risk transactions.
• Drive timely reconciliation of payment‑related accounts, vendor statements and bank reports.
• Identify, investigate and resolve duplicate, over‑, unauthorized or unsupported payments and other exceptions.
• Strengthen controls around vendor master data, bank account changes, beneficiary validation and fraud prevention.
• Ensure compliance with tax deductions, withholding tax, VAT, pension, PAYE and other statutory obligations before payments are processed.
• Lead periodic control testing, risk assessments and remediation plans for payment activities.
• Prepare and present payment control, exception, ageing and cash‑outflow reports for management.
• Support automation, ERP optimisation and digital payment control enhancements to improve accuracy and audit trail.

Required profile

• Proven strategic leadership experience in payment control or finance operations.
• Strong governance and oversight capabilities with a focus on internal controls.
• Ability to work cross‑functionally with finance, procurement, treasury, tax, audit and legal teams.
• Excellent analytical skills to identify and resolve payment exceptions and fraud risks.
• Experience in driving process improvement, automation and ERP optimisation.

Required skills