Manager - SME Acquiring

About the role

Requirements

• Education
• •     Bachelor's degree in Business, Finance, Engineering or a related field.
• •     An MBA is an advantage.
• Experience
• •     8–12 years in SME or merchant acquiring sales with a bank, acquirer, PSP or fintech in the UAE.
• •     At least 3 years leading a field sales team of 8 or more, with a track record of meeting merchant acquisition targets.
• •     Experience managing third-party or outsourced sales agents, including their commission structures.
• •     Has designed or run a sales incentive plan.
• •     Has improved an onboarding, sales or operations process with measurable results.
• Technical and payments knowledge
• •     SME acquiring products: POS, SoftPOS, payment gateway, Pay by Link and QR.
• •     Merchant onboarding requirements: KYB, documentation, risk checks, MCC and MID setup.
• •     SME pricing: MDR, fixed fees, bundles and terminal economics.
• •     Adjacent SME services: business accounts and wallets, WPS payroll and business cards are an advantage.
• •     Working knowledge of CRM and sales dashboards.
• Skills
• •     Strong sales leader: sets clear targets, coaches daily and holds the team to account.
• •     Process thinker: sees where a journey slows down and fixes it with the teams that own it.
• •     Builds strong relationships with partners, merchants and internal teams.
• •     Commercial judgement: knows when a merchant and a deal make money.
• •     Fluent English; Arabic is an an advantage in the UAE SME market.

Responsibilities

• P&L and targets: Own the SME acquiring P&L (merchants signed and live, TPV, revenue, cost of sale, contribution after team cost); set monthly targets bySales Executive and Outsourced Sales Partner; prepare budget and forecast with Finance and BI; grow revenue per merchant via cross-selling bundle (POS, SoftPOS, online checkout, Pay by Link, business wallet, WPS payroll, cards).
• Sales team leadership: Lead 10–11 Sales Executives; recruit onboarding; build a sales playbook; run sales campaigns with free zones, typing centres, business centres, accountants and associations.
• Incentive policy: Design sales incentive plan for SME team and Outsourced Partners; link incentives to live merchants and TPV/revenue; review annually and track cost vs revenue.
• Outsourced Sales Partners: Select, onboard and manage partners; contracts, targets, commission terms and SLAs; train partner staff on products, pricing, KYB and onboarding; track productivity and merchant quality monthly; replace underperforming partners.
• Merchant onboarding revamp: Map current onboarding journey end-to-end; redesign with Operations, Risk and Compliance and Product; simplify KYB and digital applications; target onboarding turnaround T+2; ensure compliance with risk and regulatory requirements.
• Merchant activation and retention: Ensure signed merchants start transacting quickly; monitor activation within 30 days of live; re-activate/retain inactive merchants; collect merchant feedback and act with Product and Operations.
• Market and competitor intelligence: Track competitor offers and market feedback; share insights monthly with Manager – Acquiring Business and BI; recommend changes to SME pricing, products and bundles based on market and sales input.

Skills

• SME acquiring sales
• P&L management
• sales leadership
• Outsourced sales management
• merchant onboarding
• KYB and regulatory compliance
• pricing and incentive design
• CRM and sales dashboards
• business development
• cross-selling financial tech products
• POS and SoftPOS knowledge
• Pay by Link and online checkout
• vendor/partner management
• revenue optimization