Firstly, what is the story behind your photo?

CD: “I recently went to Amsterdam for a weekend break, and this is me visiting what was apparently the best Stroop waffle spot in the city, at the Albert Cuyp Market.

“I’ve got a real sweet tooth, and it definitely lived up to expectations! When you travel, you have to try these local treats.”

Tell us more about your role at DNA Payments, particularly within the Competitions sector

CD: “To be honest, my role is really varied. I help onboard new merchants and then make sure they’re happy once they’re live with us, you know just ensuring they have someone to hold their hand through every step of the journey.

“And as things grow in the Competitions space, it’s also about building strong relationships and supporting customers when they scale.”

What does a ‘typical’ workday look like for you? Can you tell us what you’ve been working on today?

CD: “It’s a cliché, but I genuinely don’t have a “typical” workday. For example, today I sent out an application, did some training with Rosie on our Cash Advance offering, had a call about handling Euro payments and settlements for cross-border merchants, and spoke to a customer about a chargebacks concern.

“We’re onboarding a lot of new sites at the moment, so I also spent time reviewing our pipeline, understanding what projects are approaching and what’s further down the line. It’s always a mix of things.”

What challenges do merchants typically bring to you?

CD: “Chargebacks come up quite a bit, not huge volumes but enough that merchants want to understand how we handle them. With chargebacks in particular, we try to overcommunicate with our merchants so everyone knows what’s going on – that’s not something our competitors do, so we do get questions about that extra reporting we provide (which we’re always happy to answer!).

“Then sometimes it’s more technical issues, like how payments are working within their apps and that usually involves working closely with our technical teams to resolve things.

“Aside from that, there haven’t been too many major issues (touch wood!).”

What’s your favourite part of the job?

CD: “Definitely the people. I love building relationships with clients and I’m very down to earth, I enjoy finding common ground with them.

“When someone knows they can reach out to you, get a quick response, and trust you to help, that’s the best part for me.”

What’s coming up next in the Competitions space?

CD: “We’ve got some exciting things in the pipeline. One key focus is enabling Euro payments and settlements for cross-border merchants.

“That’ll help businesses save on exchange fees, which means they can reinvest that money into growing their business.

“We’re also working on automated payouts, which will save merchants a lot of time and effort, so they can invest that into creating new games and promotions instead.”

And finally, can you tell us about your ‘DNA Superhero’ moment that you shared on LinkedIn recently?

CD: “At the time, I was working closely with the Vesta group, one of our biggest partners and building relationships across their teams. Later, I found out when Colin joined DNA Payments in the corporate sales world, he had a meeting with one of their OpCos to talk about the relationship. Their head of commercial told him that because of my work, they decided to stay with DNA Payments instead of moving to another provider.

“I didn’t even know at the time when I was playing such a big part in retaining that partner, I was just doing my job!”