Senior Legal Counsel, South Africa

Senior Legal Counsel, South Africa

About Paystack

Paystack’s mission is to power African ambition. Over 300K businesses across Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, and Kenya use Paystack’s modern payments gateway, including Qatar Airways, MTN, Burger King, UPS, Africa World Airlines, AXA Mansard Insurance, FairMoney, PiggyVest, Crocs, Under Armour, Richemont Lifestyle Group, and many others.

Over the last 10 years, we’ve built products that have helped shape online payments in Africa, from automated recurring payments to direct bank payments and automated chargebacks. Today, Paystack is part of The Stack Group (TSG), a family of technology brands building modern infrastructure across payments, banking, consumer products, and emerging technologies.

At Paystack, we hire talented people, treat them with genuine respect, and give them the space, resources, and support to do the best work of their lives. We’d love your help.

About the role

We’re looking for a commercially minded lawyer to join our Legal & Regulatory team as Senior Legal Counsel, based in South Africa.

This role is mainly commercial. You’ll work with our commercial teams on deals from the early stages, and negotiate the agreements with merchants, banks, acquiring partners and vendors that drive revenue and margin across Paystack’s markets. You’ll also help develop the standard positions and templates we use for recurring deals, and work with the regulatory team on licences, approvals and our relationships with regulators in the region.

The role reports to the Head of Legal & Regulatory. You’ll work with country leadership, Finance, Product, Partnerships and our banking and payments partners. It’s a hands-on role: you’ll draft and negotiate yourself, and you’ll be expected to give clear advice and make sound judgement calls.

We’ll trust you to

• Work closely with sales, partnerships and product on deals from the early stages, helping to shape commercial terms and structure as opportunities develop.
• Draft, review and negotiate agreements with merchants, banks, acquiring partners and vendors across our markets, paying close attention to the terms that affect cost and margin.
• Provide clear and timely legal advice to the business. Where an issue needs a decision from leadership, you’ll set out the options and a recommended approach.
• Help develop and maintain standard positions and templates for the agreements and deal types we see most often, and keep them updated as the business and regulation change.
• Work with the regulatory team to plan license applications and regulatory approvals in line with the company’s product and launch plans, and support those applications through to approval.
• Build and maintain working relationships with regulators and card schemes in the region, and take part in regular engagement with them.
• Contribute to Paystack’s policy and industry engagement, including responses to consultations and participation in industry bodies.
• Manage external counsel across jurisdictions, and support internal and external audits, regulatory examinations, board meetings and statutory filings.

You’ll thrive in this role if you have

• 8+ years of experience as a qualified lawyer working on complex regulatory or technology matters.
• A broad legal knowledge that enables you to spot and resolve a variety of legal issues (e.g., regulatory, contract, IP, privacy, employment, consumer protection, risk); and an ability to distill complexity and to identify and clearly communicate practical, risk-based solutions.
• An ability to communicate effectively with a range of stakeholders–from risk to sales to external financial partners, startups, enterprises, and executives.
• A passion for learning about disruptive fintech business models and the intricacies of how they are structured.
• Be curious and willing to roll up your sleeves and get into the details of novel and complex business model.
• You must thrive working on a team in a fast-paced environment with priorities that frequently change and occasionally compete.
• You must be a great communicator and solid project manager, able to effectively prioritise and advance a large number of matters, often on tight deadlines.
• You must be able to work independently to drive execution on business objectives and with teammates across various jurisdictions.

Bonus points if you have

• In-house experience at a scaling fintech or payments business.
• Exposure to South African payments regulation (SARB, the TPPP framework).
• Fluency in French.

Benefits

• Competitive compensation package and benefits

• 13th month bonus

• TSG Equity compensation

• Full medical coverage

• Wellbeing stipend

• Generous leave policies

• Hybrid working environment

• Smart, kind colleagues who are invested in your growth.

• Paystack is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any kind. We’re committed to providing employees with a work environment that is progressive and open-minded. Our employment philosophy is to hire the best people and empower them to do the best work of their lives. Employment decisions are based on business needs and individual merit without regard to race, color, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, nationality, marital status, gender, or age.

• Department

• Business

• Role

• LRRC

• Locations

• Cape Town, Johannesburg

• Remote status

• Hybrid

• This posting describes a specific job opening at Paystack and contains the responsibilities, qualifications, and benefits for the role.