Global Equity Tax Specialist Tax London

Company Description

We're Checkout.com. You might not know our name, but companies like eBay, Spotify, Klarna, Uber, and Sony do, because we're behind many of the digital experiences you use every day. We are where the world checks out, enabling over 10 billion transactions yearly for more than one billion global shoppers. Whether you want to book a holiday, order food, renew a subscription, or check out online, there's a good chance our tech powers the payments behind the scenes. Our platform helps the most ambitious businesses deliver effortless digital experiences, at scale. If you want to do career-defining work, you've come to the right place. We move fast, think globally, and believe great teams are built by hiring exceptional people with conviction, curiosity, and the desire to make an impact. With 20 offices across six continents and London as our HQ, we're shaping the future of fintech - and we're just getting started.

We are looking for a pragmatic Global Equity Tax Specialist to join our Tax team. This role is primarily responsible for global equity tax at Checkout.com. You will act as the designated equity tax specialist, supported by the Employment Tax Manager, and will provide practical technical advice while improving the processes, controls and data that support equity activity, payroll, reporting and employee communications. The role sits at the intersection of Tax, Equity, Finance, Payroll, People, Legal, Accounting, Data and external advisers. You will help establish clear ownership, translate technical tax requirements into workable processes, and support the resolution of historic and live compliance matters. This is an excellent opportunity for someone who enjoys balancing hands-on technical work with process improvement, remediation, stakeholder management and continuous improvement in a business that values pace, curiosity and better ways of working.

Key Responsibilities

• Global equity tax: Act as the key equity tax specialist within the Tax team, providing practical and commercially focused advice on the employment tax treatment of equity arrangements and related events across their lifecycle. Provide tax input into plan design, country implementation, employee events, cross-border situations, liquidity activity, system changes and other business initiatives. Assess the tax treatment of equity activity across relevant jurisdictions, including sourcing, apportionment, withholding, payroll and reporting requirements. Identify when matters can be handled internally and when specialist local advice is required. Monitor legislative and business changes affecting equity taxation, withholding, reporting and cross-border treatment, translating them into clear actions for the business.
• Payroll, reporting and compliance: Work closely with Equity and Payroll to support accurate and timely withholding, payroll processing, payslip reporting, employee funding and downstream reporting. Maintain or support the global equity tax compliance calendar, coordinating returns, notifications, reporting packs, approvals and supporting evidence. Review the quality and completeness of equity tax data used for payroll, reporting, tax calculations and compliance submissions. Identify, assess and remediate historic or live issues, including missing or late filings, incorrect withholding, incomplete reporting, data weaknesses and participant-level exceptions. Support tax authority enquiries, audits, voluntary disclosures and other remediation activity, coordinating facts and evidence across teams and external advisers.
• Operating model, processes and controls: Build and continuously improve the global equity tax operating model, including ownership, hand-offs, escalation routes, service expectations and control requirements. Create and maintain practical country guidance, process documentation, decision logs, filing trackers, data specifications, exception logs and evidence trails. Help develop a scalable and audit-ready approach to managing equity tax across jurisdictions, while maintaining appropriate flexibility for local requirements. Support the design and implementation of system or process changes that affect equity tax, payroll, reporting or employee communications.
• Stakeholder and adviser management: Partner with Finance, Treasury, Payroll, People, Legal, Equity, Accounting, Strategic Finance, Data and other teams so that equity tax considerations are understood early and embedded into business decisions. Manage relationships with external tax advisers and other providers where required, setting clear briefs, challenging advice and deliverables appropriately, and converting external support into practical internal processes and retained knowledge. Develop and maintain employee-facing equity tax guides, FAQs and other explanatory materials, explaining tax mechanics clearly without presenting Checkout.com as providing personal tax advice. Provide clear updates on risks, decisions, dependencies, remediation activity and recommended actions to the Employment Tax Manager and relevant stakeholders.
• Wider employment tax contribution: Support the Employment Tax Manager with wider global employment tax advisory, compliance, risk management and process-improvement priorities where appropriate. Contribute to a high-performing team culture by taking ownership, sharing knowledge, challenging existing approaches constructively and improving how we work.

Skills & Experience

• Significant experience in global equity tax, gained in an advisory and/or in-house environment.
• Strong technical knowledge of the employment tax treatment of equity arrangements across multiple jurisdictions, including cross-border employees, sourcing, apportionment, withholding, payroll and reporting.
• Practical understanding of how equity tax interacts with payroll, employee data, finance processes and local compliance requirements.
• Experience managing or supporting equity tax compliance across multiple jurisdictions, with sound judgement about when local advice is needed.
• Experience identifying and remediating compliance gaps, including missing filings, historic withholding issues, late or inaccurate reporting, participant-level issues and weaknesses in data or controls.
• Demonstrable experience building processes, controls, documentation, country guidance and operating models in an environment where responsibilities or ways of working are still developing.
• Confidence working with data and financial systems, including the ability to interrogate and validate large datasets and use spreadsheets, equity administration platforms, Workday and other reporting tools effectively.
• Experience working with external advisers, with the ability to brief, challenge and manage them effectively while retaining ownership of the technical position and business outcome.
• Strong communication and stakeholder-management skills, with the ability to explain complex tax issues clearly and influence a wide range of partners.
• A qualified accountant or tax adviser, or equivalent professional experience.
• Private-company equity experience would be advantageous, particularly where the role has involved complex data, evolving processes, employee liquidity activity or significant change.
• Experience in financial services, payments, fintech or another complex, multinational or regulated environment would be advantageous.
• An interest in using approved technology and AI-enabled tools to improve quality, insight and efficiency.
• Hands-on, curious and delivery-focused, with sound judgement and the ability to balance detail, pace and competing priorities.

Additional Information

Bring all of you to work. We create the conditions for high performers to thrive, through real ownership, fewer blockers, and work that makes a difference from day one. Here, you'll move fast, take on meaningful challenges, and be recognized for the impact you deliver. It's a place where ambition gets met with opportunity, and where your growth is in your hands. We work as one team, and we back each other to succeed. So whatever your background or identity, if you're ready to grow and make a difference, you'll be right at home here. It's important we set you up for success and make our process as accessible as possible. So let us know in your application, or tell your recruiter directly, if you need anything to make your experience or working environment more comfortable.

Life at Checkout.com

We understand that work is just one part of your life. Our hybrid working model offers flexibility, with three days per week in the office to support collaboration and connection. Curious about what it's like to be part of our team? Visit our Careers Page to learn more about our culture, open roles, and what drives us. For a closer look at daily life at Checkout.com, follow us on LinkedIn and Instagram.