Merchant Opening Regional Lead

Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire • View all jobs

Our mission

We're making Africa the first cashless continent.

In 2017, over half the population in Sub-Saharan Africa had no bank account. That's for good reason—the fees are too high, the closest branch can be miles away, and nobody takes cards. Without access to financial institutions, people are forced to keep their savings under the mattress. Small business owners rely on lenders who charge extortionate rates. Parents spend hours waiting in line to pay school fees in cash.

We're solving this by building financial services that just work: no account fees, instantly available, and accepted everywhere. In places where electricity, water and roads don't always work, you can still send money with Wave. In 2017, we launched a mobile app in Senegal for cash deposit, withdrawal, and peer-to-peer and business payments. Now, we have millions of users across six countries and are growing fast.

Our goal is to make Africa the first cashless continent and that's where you come in.....

How you'll help us achieve it

Wave is now the largest financial institution in Senegal, with over 7 million users. And, we’re still in the early days of our product roadmap and potential impact on people’s everyday lives.

We’re looking for a Merchant Opening Regional Lead who will oversee all Wave merchant network acquiring and operations management for the assigned region by supervising all the activities of the Merchant Opening Territory leads, Supervisors, and Openers and liaising with the respective admin teams to attain the set targets in the region.

In this role, you’ll;

Merchant growth
- Coordinate with the Merchant Opening Territory Leads, Merchant Opening Supervisors, and Merchant Openers to identify opportunity areas for new merchant locations and acquire merchants according to the set merchant selection criteria and guidelines.
Merchant Contracting

Ensure the Merchant Openers recruit merchants in compliance with the legal and policy requirements as per the defined procedure.
Make sure all merchants in your region have executed valid contracts and are trained on the contents of the contract (Fees and contract-related) before the merchant signs the contract.

Inbounds Processing

Ensure all inbounds are processed within the set timeline (5 working days).

Merchant Activation and Training

Ensure all merchants are trained and certificated (all products and procedures), including Know Your Customer (KYC) and AML/CTF, as per the defined merchant training procedure and requirements.
Deliver supplies and coordinate outlet branding (Branding Officer).

Merchant Ongoing Liquidity Management

Coordinate the Monitoring of Cash Out/Wire availability at any merchant in liaison with the Agent Management Team and Liquidity Team internally.

Risk Management and Routine Visitation

Manage the teams in Monitoring merchant through reports on emerging issues and assessment of the region’s performance.

Merchant Churn

Coordinate the merchant's identification for closure (per internal procedure), recover Wave items and equipment (if any, like device), and remove branding material.

Be the primary contact person for your region's merchant network acquiring & Wave products.
- Execute operational excellence, cost management, and compliance with internal policies and regulatory guidelines.
Champion excellent customer service

Implementation of quality service delivery standards.

Key details

Location: Abidjan.
Work authorization in Côte d’Ivoire.
This is a permanent position.
Our salaries are competitive and calculated using a transparent formula.
We run Performance Reviews twice a year and give bonuses or promotions to exceptional performers who have been at the company for more than 6 months.
We offer generous health insurance for yourself and your dependents.
We support working parents - we offer 26 weeks of parental leave for mothers and 4 weeks for fathers, in addition to subsidized child care when they return to work.
Airtime reimbursement.
Free food and a beautiful office space.

Requirements

Fluency in French and English - this role will interact regularly with non-French speakers.
At least 5 years of relevant work experience, specifically managing a network in Côte d’Ivoire, including a minimum of 2 years of experience managing field-based teams (+50 persons).
Must have worked and overseen network activities in Côte d’Ivoire.

You might be a good fit if you

Are a field person.
Have good sales and negotiation skills.
Strong management skills and team spirit.
Communicate effectively and often, both in writing and in person, to the point of over-communication.
Are detail-oriented and seek to achieve excellence in everything you do.
Are a self-starter and proactive about achieving ambitious targets.
Enjoy owning projects - you're autonomous yet know when to escalate problems.
Have built and led strong teams in achieving key results.
Adjust quickly to changing priorities.
Are tech-savvy: comfortable navigating Excel and onboarding new tools.

Our team

We have a rapidly growing in-country team in Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, Burkina Faso, The Gambia, and Uganda, plus remote team members spread across the world.
We're deeply passionate about our mission of bringing radically affordable financial services to the people who need them most.
We foster autonomy for our employees. You'll own your projects at every stage, from understanding the problem to monitoring your solution in production.
We raised the largest Series A in Africa in 2021. Our world-class investors, include Founders Fund, Sequoia Heritage, Stripe, Ribbit Capital, Y Combinator, and Partech Africa.
In 2023, we were on Y Combinator's top 50 companies by revenue.

How to apply

Fill out the form below, and upload a resume in English and a cover letter describing your interest in Wave and the role.

We review applications frequently and recommend that you apply to the role that most closely aligns with your skills, experience and career goals.

Wave is an equal-opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.