Ash Gupta: American Express’ Chief Risk Officer on Fraud, Innovation in Retail-Payment Services

Although his concerns are not largely related to insurance issues, NU thought it would be interesting to take a look at the issues Ash Gupta wrestles with as the top risk-management executive at one of the world’s best-known financial-services firms.

What are the top risks faced by payment-management services companies, and how do you keep them in check?

Our greatest challenge relates to taking on credit risk and preventing and dealing with fraud. Most payment-services businesses work with huge volumes of data, processing thousands of new card applications and processing billions of cardholder transactions, so there is a heavy degree of analysis and automation when evaluating credit and fraud risks.

Have recent technological advances created more of a headache for payment-services risk managers, or have they allowed companies like American Express to innovate new services?