£700 Per Day Via Umbrella - Payments Solution Architect - £700 Per Day Via Umbrella

Payments Solution Architect

Key Responsibilities

Payments Domain Architecture

• Design and govern end-to-end payment solutions covering orchestration, order management, clearing, settlement, reconciliations, exception handling, and returns.
• Provide deep scheme-level expertise across multiple payment rails including Bacs, Faster Payments, CHAPS, SWIFT, SEPA, and cheques.
• Advise on scheme rules, settlement cycles, messaging flows, operational constraints, and compliance obligations.

ISO 20022 Architecture

• Lead and assure solution designs implementing ISO 20022 end to end.
• Define message structures, data models, mappings, validations, and cross-scheme differences.
• Review and challenge designs to ensure correct use of mandatory and optional message elements.

Solution Architecture & Design

• Produce clear functional architectures, logical component models, and system interaction designs.
• Balance immediate delivery needs with long-term architectural strategy and sustainability.
• Govern technical designs produced by engineering teams to ensure architectural integrity and standards compliance.

Leadership & Ways of Working

• Act as a trusted architecture partner to business, technology, and operations stakeholders.
• Operate independently in a fast-moving delivery environment.
• Demonstrate strong ownership, thought leadership, and a practical, delivery-focused mindset.
• Communicate complex payment and architecture concepts clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences.

Mandatory Skills & Experience

• Extensive experience as a Solution Architect in complex financial services environments.
• Deep payments execution knowledge across core bank payment rails.
• Strong, practical ISO 20022 expertise with the ability to discuss message fields, flows, and validation in detail.
• Experience governing architecture and design at scale.

Architecture & Technology Stack

ISO 20022, payment orchestration platforms, clearing and settlement systems, Bacs, Faster Payments, CHAPS, SWIFT, SEPA, cheques, enterprise integration platforms, microservices-based architectures, API integration