Airtel Money Merchant Lead

Airtel Money Kenya wishes to recruit for the role of Merchant Lead. This role reports to the Head of Airtel Money Merchant and Distribution. He/she will be responsible for expanding and strengthening the Airtel Money acceptance ecosystem across the Kenyan SMEs, corporates, and payment service providers, positioning the business as a leader in digital payments. The role drives the acquisition, activation, and performance of merchants and micro-merchants while managing key accounts, franchise partners, and distribution channel productivity

Key Responsibilities

• Develop targeted strategies to onboard merchants and micro-merchants across key Kenyan trade segments.
• Enforce trade compliance, branding standards, and service quality across the Airtel Money field network.
• Drive growth and recovery initiatives in low-activity merchant pockets such as peri-urban, estates, and rural trading centers.
• Manage and grow strategic merchant accounts including chain retailers, bill-pay partners, digital platforms, and aggregators.
• Ensure operational uptime, issue resolution, and revenue growth contribution from top-tier merchant accounts.
• Maintain regular performance reporting and stakeholder governance.
• Expand Airtel Money distribution coverage by identifying gaps across counties, estates, and high-density trading corridors.
• Recruit, train, and manage franchise partners, super-agents, and channel distributors to ensure accessibility and proximity.
• Strengthen liquidity models, float circulation, and cash management to ensure agent and merchant up time.
• Enforce trade compliance, branding standards, and service quality across the Airtel Money field network.
• Provide data-driven insights to drive adoption in key categories such as utilities payments, merchant payments, P2B, and repeat usage.
• Collaborate with Sales, Marketing, and Zonal teams to activate county-level Airtel Money penetration plans.

Qualifications and Required Competencies

• Business related Bachelors’ degree.
• Minimum 5-8 years’ experience in financial services, fintech, payments, or mobile money, distribution, key account management, or route-to-market.
• Proven track record in merchant acquisition, business development, or payments strategy.
• Strong commercial acumen, negotiation, and partnership management skills.
• Deep understanding of digital payments, mobile money, and Kenyan financial inclusion landscape.
• Experience managing franchise or distributor networks.
• Strong analytics and data interpretation skills.
• FMCG distribution knowledge and trade channel execution capability.
• Key account management and commercial negotiation skills.
• Strong route-to-market planning and channel penetration intelligence.