Reconciliation and Settlements Manager

Duplo is a Lagos-based fintech startup that enables businesses in Africa to automate their spend management, simplify cross-border payments, and control business finances all on one platform.

We want to make B2B payments as simple as P2P payment apps. Most business payments in Africa are made offline….yikes. We are on a mission to transform this. We are backed by top investors including Point Nine, Tribe Capital, Commerce Ventures, Liquid2 Ventures, Basecamp Fund, Soma Capital, YCombinator, Oui Capital, and others.

This is a unique opportunity. You'll have the responsibility and resources to take a significant part in the creation of a paradigm-changing product that will impact millions.

The Reconciliation & Settlement Manager is responsible for ensuring the accurate, timely, and complete settlement and reconciliation of Duplo’s financial transactions across its banking partners, payment processors, payment schemes, merchants, and internal platforms.

The role serves as a critical control function within Operations, ensuring that funds processed through Duplo’s ecosystem are properly accounted for, settled to the appropriate parties, and fully reconciled across Duplo’s internal records and external partner statements.

Responsibilities

1. Settlement Management

• Own the end-to-end daily settlement process for Duplo’s payment products, including payouts, collections, card acquiring, and other payment channels.
• Ensure merchants and other beneficiaries receive settlement within agreed SLAs.
• Review and validate settlement reports received from banks, payment processors, and other partners.
• Prepare and submit settlement files to banking partners where applicable.
• Monitor settlement processing from initiation through confirmation of beneficiary credit.
• Investigate failed, delayed, partial, duplicate, or incorrect settlements and drive resolution.
• Maintain accurate records of all settlement activities and outstanding settlement positions.
• Ensure settlement processes comply with agreed commercial, operational, and regulatory requirements.

2. Reconciliation

• Perform daily reconciliation of transactions across Duplo’s internal systems, bank accounts, wallets, payment processors, and merchant settlement records.
• Reconcile transaction-level data against bank statements and provider settlement reports.
• Identify discrepancies between transaction records, ledger balances, settlement files, and bank positions.
• Investigate and resolve reconciliation breaks within agreed timelines.
• Track outstanding reconciliation items and maintain an ageing report.
• Ensure all financial transactions are appropriately accounted for from transaction initiation through settlement.
• Develop and maintain robust reconciliation controls to minimise financial leakage and operational risk.

3. Liquidity & Funding Management

• Monitor liquidity positions across Duplo’s operational and settlement accounts.
• Ensure sufficient funds are available to support payout and settlement obligations.
• Monitor funding requirements across banking partners and payment providers.
• Coordinate with Finance and relevant stakeholders on funding and account movements.
• Escalate potential liquidity shortfalls or funding risks proactively.
• Maintain appropriate controls around movement of funds between Duplo accounts and partner accounts.

4. Payment Provider & Banking Partner Management

• Act as a key Operations contact for Duplo’s banking partners and payment service providers on settlement and reconciliation matters.
• Monitor provider performance against agreed SLAs.
• Escalate recurring downtime, delayed reversals, failed transactions, settlement discrepancies, and other provider-related issues.
• Follow up on outstanding reversals, refunds, chargebacks, and recovery transactions.
• Participate in partner reviews and provide operational performance reports and insights.
• Work with partners to improve settlement reliability and reduce operational exceptions.

5. Exception & Incident Management

• Own the investigation and resolution of settlement and reconciliation incidents.
• Monitor pending transactions and determine appropriate resolution based on transaction status and provider confirmation.
• Coordinate with Product and Engineering teams when system-related issues affect transaction processing or reconciliation.
• Ensure appropriate controls are applied before reprocessing transactions to prevent duplicate payouts or financial exposure.
• Maintain an incident and exception log with clear ownership, ageing, root cause, and resolution status.
• Conduct post-incident reviews and recommend preventive measures.

6. Payout & Transaction Operations

• Monitor payout transaction performance across Duplo’s payment providers.
• Track transaction success rates, failures, pending transactions, reversals, and processing times.
• Analyse provider routing performance and recommend improvements.
• Support the development and implementation of payout reprocessing and exception-handling processes.
• Ensure transactions are processed within defined operational SLAs.

7. Card Acquiring Operations

• Support the operational settlement and reconciliation processes for Duplo’s card acquiring business.
• Reconcile card transactions against acquiring bank settlement reports.
• Monitor authorisation, capture, refund, reversal, and settlement flows.
• Work with acquiring banks and internal teams to resolve settlement discrepancies.
• Support merchant onboarding and operational readiness from a settlement perspective.
• Ensure merchant settlement processes are properly configured and validated before going live.

8. Reporting & Analytics

• Prepare daily, weekly, and monthly settlement and reconciliation reports for Operations, Finance, and Management.
• Track key metrics, including:
  • Settlement accuracy
  • Settlement SLA adherence
  • Reconciliation completion rate
  • Outstanding reconciliation items
  • Provider approval/success rates
  • Transaction failure rates
  • Reversal and recovery status
  • Liquidity position
  • Settlement exceptions
• Provide insights into trends, operational risks, and areas requiring improvement.
• Maintain accurate dashboards and management reports.

9. Process Improvement & Automation

• Identify manual and inefficient processes within settlement and reconciliation operations.
• Work with Product and Engineering to automate settlement, reconciliation, exception management, and reporting processes.
• Define business requirements for operational tools and dashboards.
• Develop and maintain Settlement & Reconciliation SOPs.
• Continuously improve controls to reduce financial leakage, operational errors, and reconciliation breaks.

10. Risk, Compliance & Controls

• Ensure settlement and reconciliation processes comply with Duplo’s internal policies and applicable Nigerian regulatory requirements.
• Maintain appropriate segregation of duties and approval controls.
• Ensure all settlement and reconciliation activities have adequate supporting documentation and audit trails.
• Support internal and external audits by providing settlement records and reconciliation evidence.
• Proactively identify operational and financial risks and recommend mitigating controls.

Technical and Professional Requirements

• 8+ years’ experience in settlement, reconciliation, payment operations, treasury, or financial operations.
• Experience in fintech, banking, payment services, or related financial services.
• Strong understanding of the Nigerian payments ecosystem and hands-on experience with bank and payment provider settlements.
• Experience handling transaction exceptions, reversals, failed transactions, and financial discrepancies.
• Experience managing relationships with banks and payment service providers.
• Experience working cross-functionally with Product and Engineering teams.
• Advanced Microsoft Excel/Google Sheets and strong data analysis and reconciliation skills.
• SQL knowledge is highly desirable, while experience with BI/reporting tools such as Metabase, Power BI, or Looker is an advantage.
• Understanding of payment APIs, transaction flows, wallets, ledgers, settlement files, NIBSS, card acquiring, and Visa/Mastercard settlement.
• Strong attention to detail, analytical thinking, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.
• Demonstrated ownership and ability to drive issues through to resolution.
• Strong stakeholder management and communication skills.
• Process-oriented approach with the ability to build scalable and controlled operational processes.
• Ability to lead, manage, and develop members of the Settlement & Reconciliation team
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with excellent attention to detail.