Head of Legal [Payments, Fintech, Remote]

We are looking for a Head of Legal to join a growing payment platform focused on recurring and subscription-based payments. This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who can take ownership of the legal function, work closely with the founders and management team, and build a legal framework that supports the company's international growth.

The ideal candidate combines strong experience in payments / fintech with a commercial mindset and understands how to balance regulatory requirements, legal risk and business objectives.

Key Responsibilities

• Own and further develop the company's legal function, policies and legal processes.
• Act as a strategic legal partner to founders and senior management.
• Build a scalable legal framework supporting the company's growth across different markets.
• Identify legal risks and provide practical, business-oriented solutions.
• Coordinate external legal counsel where required.
• Provide legal support across the company's payment operations and recurring payment model.
• Advise on applicable payment services, fintech and financial-services regulation.
• Support relationships and contractual frameworks with acquiring banks, PSPs, payment partners and other financial institutions.
• Work closely with Compliance and Risk teams on regulatory requirements, AML/KYC-related matters and internal policies.
• Support licensing, regulatory applications and expansion into new jurisdictions where applicable.
• Monitor regulatory developments relevant to the business and translate them into actionable requirements.
• Draft, review and negotiate commercial agreements with merchants, partners, vendors and technology providers.
• Manage agreements with PSPs, acquirers, banks and other payment ecosystem partners.
• Develop and standardise contract templates and contracting processes.
• Support Sales and Account Management teams during negotiations with strategic clients.
• Advise the business on contractual liability, termination, pricing structures, SLAs, disputes and other commercial matters.
• Provide legal guidance around subscription-based business models and recurring billing.
• Support the development of customer terms, merchant agreements and payment-related policies.
• Advise on consumer protection, cancellation and refund requirements, chargebacks and recurring payment authorisation.
• Work with Product and Commercial teams to ensure new payment flows and products are legally compliant and commercially scalable.
• Advise on GDPR, privacy, data processing and data-sharing arrangements.
• Review new products, integrations and features from a legal and regulatory perspective.
• Work closely with Product and Tech teams to embed legal requirements into product development rather than addressing them only after launch.
• Support corporate governance and internal legal documentation.
• Manage legal aspects of corporate structuring and international expansion.
• Support shareholder, investment, financing and M&A-related matters when required.
• Establish effective legal risk management and reporting processes

Requirements

• Strong legal background with significant experience in fintech, payments, PSP, acquiring, payment gateways or financial services.
• Solid understanding of the European payments regulatory environment.
• Experience working with commercial contracts in an international B2B environment.
• Understanding of recurring payments and subscription-based business models is a strong advantage.
• Good knowledge of GDPR, consumer protection and digital services regulation.
• Ability to work directly with founders and senior leadership.
• Strong commercial judgement — able to explain not only what the legal risk is, but how the business can move forward safely.
• Comfortable operating in a fast-changing environment with a high degree of ownership.
• Experience building or scaling a legal function would be a strong advantage.
• Fluent English.

Role Scope

This is not a purely advisory legal position. We are looking for someone who can build the legal architecture of the company, establish processes and standards, and become a trusted partner to the business.

Initially, the role will be highly hands-on. As the company grows, the Head of Legal will have the opportunity to build and lead the legal function and team.