Client Solutions – Authorisation & Optimisation Specialist

About This Role

Job Title : Client Solutions – Authorisation & Optimisation Specialist (PMO)

Employment type : Contract

Contract length : 3 months

Location : Abu Dhabi, UAE

PURPOSE OF THE PROJECT As the Authorisation & Optimisation Specialist, the responsible will lead the payment optimisation initiatives for issuer clients by leveraging advanced analytics and deep transaction expertise. Driving end-to-end program delivery through strong PMO discipline, identifying approval rate opportunities, reducing declines, and enhancing transaction efficiency. Partner with internal and external stakeholders to implement data-driven strategies that improve authorisation performance, customer experience, and overall payment success rates.

Core Responsibilities and Accountabilities:

• Lead and improve issuer authorisation approval rates by analysing transaction data, identifying decline drivers, and implementing optimisation strategies across the payment lifecycle.
• Leverage advanced analytics to generate actionable insights on transaction performance, customer behaviour, and authorisation trends, translating findings into measurable improvements.
• Partner with issuer clients to diagnose performance gaps, recommend tailored authorisation strategies, and support implementation to enhance payment success rates and customer experience.
• Drive the end-to-end delivery of optimisation initiatives using strong PMO practices, ensuring timely execution, stakeholder alignment, and tracking of KPIs and outcomes.
• Collaborate with internal teams (product, risk, technology) and external partners to align on solutions, resolve issues, and continuously improve authorisation processes and payment performance.

Knowledge and Experience:

• Strong understanding of card transaction flows, authorisation logic, decline codes, and issuer/acquirer interactions, with hands-on experience in optimising approval rates and payment performance.
• Proven ability to analyse large transaction datasets, identify performance drivers, and translate insights into actionable strategies using data-driven methodologies.
• Demonstrated experience in managing end-to-end initiatives, with strong governance, stakeholder management, and delivery tracking to ensure successful execution of complex programs.

Mandatory Skills:

• Bachelor's degree in Finance, Business, Technology, or a related field (Master's preferred).
• Previous experience within Banking, Digital Payment & Card solutions or the FinTech industry.
• Regional experience across the GCC, including working in a faced-paced matrix organisation.
• Excellent communication skills in English (written, verbal, and presentation); fluency in Arabic is nice to have.

Preferred Skills:

• Good understanding of payment systems, digital platforms, system workflows, security basics, and industry technologies.
• An understanding of regional regulations across financial services or payment networks.