Head of Schemes Relationships in Newcastle upon Tyne

At U.S. Bank, we're on a journey to do our best. Helping the customers and businesses we serve to make better and smarter financial decisions, enabling the communities we support to grow and succeed in the right ways, all more confidently and more often—that's what we call the courage to thrive. We believe it takes all of us to bring our shared ambition to life, and each person is unique in their potential. A career with U.S. Bank gives you a wide, ever-growing range of opportunities to discover what makes you thrive.

As a wholly owned subsidiary of U.S. Bank, Elavon is committed to building the platforms and ecosystems that help over 1.5 million customers around the world to achieve their financial goals—no matter what they need. From transaction processing to customer service, to driving innovation and launching new products, we're building a range of tailored payment solutions powered by the latest technology. As part of our team, you can explore what motivates and energizes your career goals: partnering with our customers, our communities, and each other.

We actively uphold transparent and fair hiring practices that support individual opportunity, inclusive culture, and career mobility across all levels of our organisation. We offer meaningful opportunities for growth, a culture of inclusion, and a strong commitment to transparency and integrity in everything we do.

Job Description

Working within the European commercial team covering all scheme related activity, management and operations. The role holder will be driven by achieving consistently improving commercial outcomes that are materially important to the European business. The position requires a strategic and synchronized perspective, extraordinary stakeholder management, and tried and tested change and leadership skills coupled with intellectual curiosity to identify new ideas, challenge the status quo and ultimately be passionate about our relationships with schemes.

Main Role Responsibilities:

• Acts as a liaison with card schemes, including but not limited to Visa, Mastercard, Discover, Amex, UPI, JCB.
• Coaches, supports and optimises the team and their associated processes.
• Maintains knowledge of all products and services offered by card schemes.
• Commercial negotiations with the schemes and contract negotiations with partners.
• Day to day performance management and analysis, driving enablement for volume growth.
• Ensures the consistent and successful implementation of centralized initiatives and communications at the local market level.
• Actively participates and drives relevant projects with value-based outcomes.
• Support with customer facing discussion on cards to drive acceptance.
• Implementation/roll out of Operational process efficiencies and/or Gap analysis for the relevant scheme, working with operations and compliance.
• Will run the management process across all Scheme related KPI within the European financial plan, running forecasts, RCA and control of action planning.

Role Requirements:

• 5+ years in a payments industry as a leader or director.
• Strong commercial acumen and understanding of contractual opportunities.
• Good knowledge of the European payments landscape.
• Strong communication, negotiation and influencing skills.
• Ability to work cross functionally and across different markets.
• Good organizational and project management skills.
• Effective presentation and strong verbal and written communication skills.

This role requires working from a U.S. Bank location three (3) or more days per week.

Accessibility

We are committed to providing an inclusive and accessible recruitment experience. If you need adjustments at any stage of the application or hiring process, please contact your recruiter for guidance and support.

Total Rewards

U.S. Bank is committed to fair, equitable, and transparent compensation practices in line with local regulatory and legal requirements. Our total rewards approach is designed to attract, retain, and support top talent while ensuring equal pay for work of equal value. We offer a market-competitive compensation package that includes:

• Clearly defined salary ranges aligned with industry benchmarks and internal equity standards.
• Performance-based incentives for eligible employees, awarded through transparent, objective criteria that recognize both individual and company performance.
• Inclusive equitable benefits that are accessible to all employees and focused around our 3 main pillars of financial wellbeing, health & wellness.
• Continuous development opportunities including training, education support, and career progression pathways based on inclusive and transparent criteria.
• Employee recognition programs that celebrate achievements and milestones for all.
• We regularly review our compensation and benefits to ensure they remain competitive, inclusive, and responsive to employee needs and market trends.

Further details of the compensation package will be provided upon application. We encourage candidates to explore the full value of our offer, including monetary and non-monetary benefits.

Closing Date

Posting may be closed earlier due to high volume of applicants. We aim to provide timely updates throughout the process and encourage early applications to ensure consideration.