Building a Product Team for the New Era of Payments

By Rosie McConnell, Product Director, IFX Payments 

I’ve always enjoyed looking under the hood. When it comes to payments there’s a lot more than meets the eye.

Starting my career in financial operations at a global payments company, I became interested in the complexities of acquiring, settlements, and reconciliation. Payments may seem invisible day to day, but making sure they run smoothly is a real challenge – and one I’ve wanted to take on ever since.

Now, as Product Director at IFX Payments, I’m focusing on tackling the industry’s next set of problems and finding better ways to move money around the world.

From a bootstrapped startup to an established scaleup

When I joined IFX Payments, the company was shifting. A classic bootstrapped, agile startup, our teams were cross-functional and collaborative, enabling the company to scale rapidly. A major turning point was launching ibanq, IFX’s all-in-one platform enabling businesses to send, receive and manage multi-currency funds with ease.

Up to this point, institutions were struggling to manage complex funds or payment operations across multiple jurisdictions and currencies. International payment reconciliation was and, in many cases, still is, a headache. We tackled that problem with our product.

Co-ordinating and launching the platform was one of my proudest moments at IFX Payments. It’s had a significant impact on the growth trajectory of the business. Since the launch of ibanq, IFX Payments has transformed from brokerage business into a trusted alternative banking partner, offering international payments alongside bespoke FX services.

Being able to deliver that has a lot to do with the team behind it.

The keys to building a successful product team: Learnings from ibanq

We’ve learnt a lot during the creation and launch of ibanq, including the key characteristics required to build and scale a successful product team.

Performing well under pressure

A key to building a successful product team is fostering curiosity even under pressure. By staying inquisitive, resilient, and open to possibilities, the team can uncover better ways forward rather than defaulting to the obvious – and falling into the trap of simply digitalising outdated processes or models. Alongside this mindset, discipline in prioritisation ensures that energy is focused on what matters most, enabling the team to achieve the most effective outcomes with the resources at hand.

Clear values and purpose

Another key to success has been establishing clear values and a purpose-driven ethos. That can be best summed up with the concept of ‘Win. Properly.’ That means a strong focus on high performance and teamwork, whilst delivering it with excellence. By following these values, we consistently exceed industry standards and deliver excellent service without cutting corners. It also means taking individual accountability, promoting collaboration and implementing a culture of continuous improvement.

Transparency and communication

Finally, transparency and open communication are paramount to achieving success. We operate a fail fast and psychologically safe environment that brings out the best in people to build great products. As a team, we have an aligned understanding of the problem that needs to be solved and we work on solutions together; with each team member taking personal responsibility and becoming an expert in their specific field.

All of these have contributed to delivering a great product. We also have to keep on top of innovation and changes in the payments space.

Where is the payments space now? The fraud threat

From my vantage point, I’ve been able to see not only the changes to IFX Payments but also how the industry around us is changing. I’m a big advocate of payments innovation but I also see how there are several barriers to this.

One of the main barriers to payment innovation right now and in the years to come will be protecting the customer from payment fraud. Authorised Push Payment (APP) Fraud, where a customer is tricked into sending money to a fraudster posing as someone legitimate, is a growing issue across the UK. According to UK Finance, in the first half of 2024, £570 million was lost due to payment fraud and scams. Of that overall figure, £213.7 million was due to APP Fraud.

The first step to staying protected is driving awareness. At IFX Payments we’ve implemented a culture of compliance so that everyone is aware of the threats and how to combat them. From ‘social engineering’ where criminals impersonate trusted entities such as banks or police to ‘romance scams,’ when a criminal uses a fake profile to form a relationship with the victim, we’re always challenging ourselves to stay on top of the threats.

Regulation will almost certainly intensify in the years to come in response to the evolving nature of APP fraud, so we’re working hard to stay on top of regulatory change. We’re also leveraging the latest technologies in the fight against payment fraud. We’ve implemented Confirmation of Payee (CoP) and Verification of Payee (VoP), which confirm the bank account details match the person making a payment request. I can also see how artificial intelligence can be effectively deployed to detect fraud in real time, reducing the risk and burden of compliance by automating regulatory checks.

The future of payments innovation

As for future innovation, I’m anticipating increased interoperability within payment methods. This is the ability to integrate different payment systems with each other. An expanding variety of payment methods are increasingly being used including blockchain-based infrastructure, so it’s essential that payment teams consider how they will integrate different systems to make the payments journey instant and seamless for customers across the globe.

Ultimately, the goal of payments infrastructure going forward will be creating and sending payments that really are invisible and intelligent. This can be observed already with the growth of account-to-account (A2A) payments and open banking, making it easier than ever before to send payments instantly.

While there are many advantages to using these types of technologies, as an industry we should also proceed with caution. We need a compliance-led approach to innovation to protect customers and the wider ecosystem. Not only that, but with a changing risk appetite, it’s essential SMEs are given proper consideration and continue to have fair access to financial services.