Manager - Banking Relationships & Payment Commercials

Role Overview

The Manager - Banking Relationships & Payment Commercials owns the entire banking and payments commercial relationship for the group. This is a specialist commercial role with a single mandate: secure the best commercial terms available in the market across corporate credit cards, payment gateways, POS, banking charges, credit facilities, and forex - and build and maintain strong, healthy, long-term relationships with every banking and payment partner.

The successful candidate comes from a banking, payments, or cards background. Because they understand how banks and payment providers price these products from the inside, they are uniquely positioned to benchmark the market, negotiate aggressively, and consistently bring the company the most competitive commercials. They will act as the company's single point of accountability for the banking ecosystem - managing relationship managers, product heads, and senior banking stakeholders, and ensuring the company is always on best-available terms.

This is a high-leverage role. In a high-volume, thin-margin B2B travel business, payment and banking commercials are a direct lever on margin, working capital, and revenue. Every basis point negotiated on MDR or interchange, every improvement in card cashback or float, and every reduction in forex spread on overseas DMC payments drops straight to the bottom line.

Business Impact of the Role

Etrav processes very high transaction volumes across airline ticketing, hotel distribution, and destination management. Corporate credit cards are a core funding and float mechanism for airline and supplier payments, where cashback, reward yield, and interest-free periods represent real revenue and working capital. Payment gateways and POS terminals power customer and agent collections, where MDR and transaction fees are a recurring cost that scales directly with growth. Eagle Crest's DMC operations across Dubai, Bali, Vietnam, Thailand, the Maldives, and India generate substantial cross-border remittances, where forex spreads materially affect cost.

By owning these commercials end-to-end - benchmarking continuously, renegotiating on volume growth, and maintaining healthy bank relationships that unlock preferential terms - this role directly improves margin, optimizes float and working capital, reduces forex and payment costs, and maximizes card-based revenue. It also de-risks the business by ensuring all banking arrangements remain compliant, well-documented, and resilient across multiple partners rather than concentrated with one.

Key Responsibilities

Banking Relationship Management

- Act as the group's single point of contact and owner of all banking partner relationships across Etrav Tech and Eagle Crest.

- Build and maintain strong, healthy, long-term relationships with relationship managers, product heads, and senior banking stakeholders.

- Conduct regular business reviews with each bank, manage escalations, and ensure consistent service quality and responsiveness.

- Map the banking ecosystem, maintain a diversified panel of partners, and identify and onboard new banking partners where they deliver better terms or capability.

Corporate Credit Cards

- Own and manage all corporate credit card programs across the group, including issuance, limits, controls, and lifecycle management.

- Negotiate best-in-market card commercials: cashback and reward rates, credit limits, interest-free / float periods, fee waivers, and airline / category-specific benefits.

- Optimize card spend routing across issuers to maximize cashback yield and free-credit float on airline and supplier payments.

- Coordinate with the Finance team on accurate reconciliation of card spends, cashback, and reward realization.

Payment Gateway & POS Commercials

- Own commercial relationships with payment gateways, aggregators, and POS / terminal providers used for agent and customer collections.

- Negotiate the lowest achievable MDR, transaction fees, setup, and maintenance charges, and renegotiate as volumes grow.

- Benchmark payment gateway and POS commercials continuously against the market across cards, UPI, net banking, and wallets.

- Manage settlement cycles (e.g. T+1), chargeback terms, success-rate optimization, and reconciliation support, and evaluate / onboard new providers where beneficial.

Overall Banking & Forex Commercials

- Negotiate all banking commercials: current account terms, transaction banking and cash-management charges, NEFT / RTGS / IMPS fees, and BG / LC pricing.

- Negotiate competitive forex spreads, remittance charges, and cross-border payment commercials supporting Eagle Crest's overseas DMC operations.

- Negotiate and manage credit lines, working-capital, and overdraft facilities on the best available rates, limits, and terms.

- Optimize float, idle balances, and liquidity arrangements (sweeps / auto-sweeps) to improve working-capital efficiency.

Market Intelligence & Benchmarking

- Maintain a live, documented benchmark of the best commercials available in the market across banks, gateways, and card issuers.

- Track new banking and payment products, schemes, network changes, and RBI / regulatory developments that affect commercials.

- Proactively bring cost-saving and revenue-enhancing proposals to the Managing Director with clear commercial business cases.

Compliance & Governance

- Ensure all banking and payment arrangements remain compliant with RBI guidelines, FEMA (for forex / cross-border), KYC norms, and PCI-DSS where applicable.

- Maintain complete and current documentation of every agreement, commercial term, amendment, and renewal.

- Coordinate with Finance and internal audit to ensure all negotiated commercials are correctly applied, billed, and reconciled.

Key Performance Indicators

- Blended Payment Cost: Reduce blended MDR plus gateway / POS processing cost as a percentage of payment throughput against a defined baseline, reviewed monthly.

- Corporate Card Yield: Maximize total card value realized - cashback, rewards, and free-credit float - as a percentage of corporate card spend.

- Commercial Benchmarking: Maintain 100% of banking, card, and payment commercials at or better than the prevailing market benchmark, validated through quarterly benchmarking reviews.

- Relationship Health: Maintain active, healthy relationships with all partner banks and resolve service escalations within agreed SLAs, with no unresolved relationship breakdowns.

- Forex & Remittance Cost: Reduce the average forex spread and remittance cost on Eagle Crest cross-border DMC payments against baseline.

- Working-Capital & Facility Terms: Secure best-available interest rates, limits, and terms on credit lines and working-capital facilities, and improve float days.

- New / Renegotiated Deals: Deliver a target number of new partner onboardings and volume-based renegotiations each year that improve commercials.

- Compliance & Documentation: Maintain 100% compliant and fully documented banking arrangements with zero regulatory or documentation lapses.

Required Qualifications

Education

- Bachelor's degree in Commerce, Finance, or Business Administration.

- MBA in Finance or equivalent post-graduate qualification preferred.

Mandatory Banking Background

- 8+ years of experience in banking, payments, or cards, with a strong, demonstrable track record in commercial negotiation and relationship management.

- Direct experience within a bank, payment gateway, card network, or fintech - for example in corporate / transaction banking, merchant acquiring, cards, or relationship management - is mandatory.

- Proven experience negotiating MDR, corporate card programs, payment gateway / POS commercials, forex spreads, and credit facilities.

Domain Knowledge

- Deep understanding of how banks and payment providers price cards, MDR / interchange, transaction banking, forex, and credit - i.e. knowing where the real negotiating room sits.

- Strong working knowledge of the payments ecosystem: issuers, acquirers, networks (Visa / Mastercard / RuPay / UPI), aggregators, and settlement mechanics.

- Familiarity with RBI guidelines, FEMA (cross-border / forex), and PCI-DSS principles relevant to payments.

Technical Skills

- Advanced Microsoft Excel and commercial modeling - able to build clear cost-benefit and like-for-like commercial comparisons.

- Comfort with corporate / net-banking portals, card-management platforms, and payment-gateway / POS dashboards.

Preferred Qualifications

- Exposure to the travel, e-commerce, or other high-volume transaction industries.

- An existing network of relationships with major banks and payment providers in India.

- Experience with cross-border / multi-currency payments, directly relevant to DMC operations.

- Experience with corporate card and expense / spend-management platforms.

- Prior experience working with internal audit and implementing commercial controls and documentation frameworks.

Skills & Competencies

Core Strengths

- Commercial negotiation - the central skill of the role; able to consistently extract best-in-market terms.

- Relationship management - builds trust and healthy, durable relationships across multiple banking partners.

- Commercial acumen - quantifies the rupee impact of every term and prioritizes accordingly.

- Market benchmarking and analytical thinking - keeps a live, evidence-based view of what 'best' looks like.

Professional Skills

- Clear communication to present commercial proposals and savings to senior management.

- High integrity and confidentiality in handling sensitive commercial and banking information.

- Organized documentation discipline across agreements, renewals, and compliance.

- Proactive ownership - brings opportunities forward rather than waiting to be asked.

Systems & Tools Used

- Corporate and net-banking portals across multiple banking partners.

- Corporate credit card management and spend-control platforms.

- Payment gateway and POS dashboards and settlement reporting.

- Forex / treasury and remittance platforms.

- Reconciliation and finance / ERP systems used within the group.

- Advanced Excel and commercial comparison / benchmarking models.

Career Growth Path

This role is the foundation of a dedicated treasury and banking function within the group. Strong performance can progress into a Head of Treasury & Banking position, taking on broader responsibility for liquidity, investments, debt, and group-wide financial relationships - and ultimately into senior finance leadership as the business scales.