Business Analyst

Role Summary

The Business Analyst will support the design, enhancement, and delivery of a Merchant Acquiring & Payment Acceptance product. This role requires an in-depth understanding of payment processing, acquiring flows, merchant lifecycle management, settlement cycles, and integration with processors, gateways, and card networks.

The Analyst will collaborate with product, engineering, QA, operations, compliance, and external partners to translate business needs into functional and technical specifications.

Key Responsibilities

A. Requirements Gathering & Analysis

• Lead requirement elicitation through stakeholder interviews, workshops, process reviews, and data analysis
• Translate business needs into clear, structured BRD/FRD/SRS documents, user stories, and acceptance criteria
• Analyse current vs. target processes, perform gap analysis, and define workflows, data models, and system impacts
• Collaborate with Product, Tech, QA, and UI/UX teams to ensure clarity, feasibility, and alignment of requirements
• Manage requirement changes, maintain traceability, and support planning across sprints and releases
• Support QA/UAT by validating requirements, resolving clarifications, and ensuring end-to-end coverage

B. Payment Processing & Acquiring Expertise

• Deep understanding of acquiring flows involving issuer, acquirer, network, and processor
• Familiarity with ISO 8583 messages, clearing/settlement files, scheme mandates, and liability shifts
• Understanding of the merchant lifecycle:
• Application Underwriting Approval Activation
• Transaction Processing
• Settlement, reconciliation, disputes
• Strong knowledge of PCI DSS, 3DS, fraud checks, dispute/chargeback workflows

C. Documentation & Artifacts

• Create high-quality product documentation:
• BRDs, FRDs, User Manual
• User stories and acceptance criteria
• Sequence diagrams, flowcharts, mock-ups, and field mapping sheets
• Maintain version control and traceability throughout design and development

D. API & Integration Work

• Define API request/response structures, validations, and error codes
• Assist in integration with acquiring processors, payment gateways, token vaults, and fraud engines
• Create mapping sheets for: Processor request/response
• Settlement file layouts
• Reconciliation inputs and outputs
• Work with engineering to validate contract compliance across systems

E. Stakeholder Communication

• Facilitate discussions with product, engineering, QA, operations, and compliance teams.
• Conduct grooming sessions, walkthroughs, and requirement clarifications.
• Support external clients/partners with requirement understanding, integration queries, and certification processes.
• Communicate timelines, risks, and key decisions clearly and accurately.

F. Testing & Validation

• Work closely with QA to define test scenarios, edge cases, and data preparation requirements
• Execute functional and API tests to confirm alignment with requirements
• Review processor certification results and help troubleshoot issues
• Participate in UAT and ensure deployment readiness

Required Skills & Qualifications:

A. Core Competencies

• Strong analytical thinking and structured problem solving
• Excellent documentation and communication skills
• Comfortable working with technical details, system behaviours, and data fields
• Ability to translate business problems into engineering-ready specifications

B. Domain Expertise (Mandatory)

• Practical experience in merchant acquiring or payment acceptance
• Understanding of: ISO 8583, ISO 20022, NACHA, network message formats
• Authorization/clearing/settlement lifecycle
• Payment methods (cards, ACH/eCheck, wallets, UPI, RTP)
• Tokenization, fraud screening
• Reconciliation, dispute, and chargeback processes

C. Tools & Technologies

• Postman, Swagger, JIRA, Confluence
• Miro / Figma / Visio for flows and diagrams
• Basic SQL and data interpretation
• API-first product architecture familiarity