Job Title: Head – Accounts Payable Department: Finance & Accounts Location: Mumbai Reporting To: CFO / Financial Controller
Role Summary: We are looking for a seasoned finance professional to lead the Accounts Payable function for our fast-paced travel business. The role involves managing all aspects of trade-related payables for airlines, hotel partners, GDS systems, aggregators, and DMCs, ensuring accurate reconciliations, timely settlements, and strong vendor relationships. The ideal candidate will bring deep experience in supplier accounting and lead a large team to deliver scalable, automated, and audit-compliant AP operations.Key Responsibilities: 1. Trade Payables Operations
- Oversee end-to-end processing of invoices and financial transactions for airline partners, hotel suppliers, consolidators, and third-party travel platforms.
- Ensure accurate accounting and classification of supplier liabilities across flights, hotels, ancillary services, and packages.
- Maintain consistency in processing through defined SOPs aligned with industry practices (e.g. BSP, LCC payments, credit shells, hotel commission invoices, etc.). 2. Reconciliation & Dispute Management
- Drive periodic reconciliations with airline GDS platforms (Amadeus, Galileo, Sabre), LCC portals, hotel aggregators, and DMCs.
- Resolve mismatches across systems (booking engines vs. financial data vs. partner claims).
- Monitor unapplied credits, advances, and ensure closure of old balances. 3. Payments & Cash Flow Control
- Ensure timely vendor settlements aligned with supplier terms and business cash flow requirements.
- Work closely with treasury on payment cycles, credit utilization, and fund planning across domestic and international suppliers. 4. Business Partnering & Stakeholder Management
- Act as the finance SPOC for commercial, product, operations, and tech teams.
- Support commercial negotiations with financial insights, reconciliation data, and partner performance metrics.5. Team Leadership & Automation
- Lead and mentor a large team managing high-volume transaction processing across multiple verticals.
- Champion automation in reconciliation, payment processing, and reporting through ERP and travel-tech system integrations.
- Collaborate with tech teams on improving booking-to-accounting mapping and process integrity. 6. Compliance & Audit
- Coordinate with statutory and internal auditors to close AP-related queries, confirmations, and documentation.
Qualifications & Experience:
- Education: CA / CMA / MBA (Finance) or equivalent.
- Experience: 10+ years in Accounts Payable with a strong background in travel, tourism, or OTA businesses.
- Proven track record of handling payables and reconciliations for airlines, hotel suppliers, and international vendors would be preferred
- Strong understanding of travel-specific financial practices like BSP settlements, LCC portals, credit shell management, and multi-GDS accounting.
Key Skills:
- In-depth knowledge of travel products and supply-side partner models.
- Strong reconciliation, accounting, and dispute resolution capabilities.
- Experience in ERP (Microsoft dynamics preferred)
- Excellent team leadership and stakeholder communication skills.
- High attention to detail with a process improvement mindset.
Behavioral Competencies:
- Ownership-driven, process-oriented, and solution-focused.
- Ability to thrive in a dynamic, high-volume, multi-product environment.
- Excellent interpersonal skills to navigate across internal teams and external partners.
