SEA Regional Collections Operations Lead

About the Role

Lazada Financial Services, under Ant Group, operates a rapidly scaling consumer credit portfolio across Southeast Asia — including Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) and Cash Loan products embedded within the Lazada e-commerce ecosystem. As we continue to grow our lending business across Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, and Singapore, we are looking for a seasoned Regional Collections Operations Lead to own the end-to-end collections function across the region.

What You Will Own

1. Regional Collections Performance

• Set and drive recovery rate targets across Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, and Singapore, covering both BNPL and Cash Loan portfolios.
• Own the full collections funnel: pre-due outreach, early delinquency (M1/M2), deep delinquency, and outsourced agency performance.
• Define and continuously optimize collections strategy by DPD bucket, product type, and customer segment.
• Monitor key KPIs daily — coverage rate, contact rate, PTP rate, roll rate, recovery rate — and build action plans when metrics deviate.

2. BPO & Vendor Management

• Source, onboard, and manage BPO partners across multiple markets; establish competitive multi-vendor frameworks to maximize delivery.
• Conduct regular business reviews with BPO management; hold vendors accountable through data-driven SLA frameworks.
• Build contingency plans to mitigate single-vendor concentration risk across all markets.

3. In-House Team Building

• Establish and scale in-house collections capabilities in markets where direct operations are strategically required.
• Hire, train, and develop local HRO collections staff; build performance management systems that drive agent-level accountability.
• Design incentive schemes — ranking-based or target-based — that link individual agent output directly to recovery results.

4. Strategy & Analytics

• Analyze collections data across the full customer lifecycle; identify root causes of performance gaps and translate findings into concrete operational actions.
• Design and run A/B tests on contact strategies, messaging cadence, channel mix, and settlement offers.
• Partner with the Risk team to optimize Skip model performance, refine early intervention triggers, and improve fraud case recovery.
• Work with Product & Tech to drive tooling roadmaps: auto-dialer deployment, debt restructuring platforms, and digital outreach channels (WhatsApp, LINE, Viber, SMS, Email).

5. Compliance & Regulatory Navigation

• Ensure all collections activities comply with local debt collection laws and consumer protection regulations in each market.
• Maintain full awareness of regulatory variance across markets.
• Oversee vendor compliance; ensure BPO partners adhere to local legal requirements and internal conduct standards.

6. Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Serve as the primary bridge between Collections, Risk, Product, and Finance; translate operational realities into actionable product and policy requirements.
• Present performance updates and strategic proposals to senior leadership and regional stakeholders.
• Collaborate with Risk on segmentation strategy, customer treatment policies, and portfolio prioritization.

What We Are Looking For

1. Experience

• 8+ years in consumer credit collections operations, with at least 4 years in a multi-country or regional leadership role.
• Proven track record in Southeast Asia collections — deep familiarity with at least two of: Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia.
• Demonstrated experience in BPO vendor sourcing, contract negotiation, performance management, and commission model design.
• Prior experience in fintech, digital banking, BNPL, or e-commerce lending strongly preferred.

2. Skills

• Exceptional data fluency — able to independently pull, analyze, and act on collections data; SQL is a strong plus.
• Strong command of collections strategy design: dialing strategy, channel sequencing, skip tracing, settlement programs, legal escalation.
• Demonstrated ability to build and manage high-performance teams across cultures and time zones.
• Strong project management capabilities; able to run multiple operational improvement initiatives simultaneously.
• Excellent written and spoken English — mandatory.
• Mandarin Chinese — significant plus.

3. Mindset

• Comfortable in fast-paced, high-ambiguity environments where strategy and priorities can shift quickly.
• Bias toward action: identifies problems quickly, proposes clear solutions, executes with urgency.
• Analytically rigorous but operationally pragmatic — knows when to go deep and when to move fast.
• Culturally sensitive — understands the nuances of managing teams and vendors across diverse SEA markets.