Legal Counsel - 12 month FTC

About this role

About us GoCardless, a Mollie company, is a global leader in bank payments. Over 100,000 businesses, from start-ups to household names, use GoCardless to collect, manage and send bank payments through Direct Debit, real-time payments and open banking. With US$130bn+ processed annually across 30+ countries, we handle recurring and one-off payments without the chasing, stress, or expensive fees. Our end-to-end payment platform also features AI-powered solutions to improve payment success and reduce fraud, alongside connections to over 350 platforms businesses use everyday. We are headquartered in the UK, with teams and operations spanning North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific. For more information, please visit www.gocardless.com and follow us on LinkedIn @GoCardless. Mollie is the leading payments and financial services partner for business, rooted in Europe, with global reach. The role This role is a fixed-term contract for 12 months, as maternity cover. • As Legal Counsel (2-3 years of PQE), you will focus on a number of legal areas and advise teams across the business. • You will take a consultative approach and work closely with the business - never working alone, or able to concentrate on purely legal issues. As a member of a busy legal team you will also be expected to contribute to team-wide initiatives. • The key responsibilities of this role include: • Review and negotiate customer, partnership and supplier contracts by providing pragmatic and commercial support • Work on projects for example when we roll out new templates • Build out and maintain self-help tools, playbooks and guides for the legal team and for the wider business • Focus on constant process improvement related to high volume work - for example by iterating our contracting automation and management workflows • Be prepared to deal with any legal issue, at any time. We’re approaching ‘Legal Risk’ in Financial Services in a new way. • We are ready to serve everyone, if we wanted to - we ensure Legal Risk does not constrain the business but empowers it to achieve its goals; • We create the best possible customer experience - we want our customers (both internal and external) to look forward to going through our processes; and • We aim to automate wherever possible - we don’t like inefficiencies nor do we believe that real risk mitigation is achieved by throwing people at the problem. The Legal Function is at the forefront of GoCardless’ expansion. We must ensure that GoCardless adopts, implements and maintains forward-thinking and appropriate processes and controls, often coming across new challenges or issues that require innovative solutions. Desired skills We’re looking for a lawyer with private practice training and/or in-house experience in a fast-paced environment. You will be driven, able to work independently and able to apply your existing knowledge and approach across a very wide range of legal (and quasi-legal) areas. As a technology business, it helps if you have had experience in a similar area, or perhaps you have a keen interest in tech outside of your day to day work. We’d love to hear from you if: • You grasp new legal concepts quickly, and are not afraid to use your common sense. • You are able to appropriately challenge ways of working and not be afraid to ask why. • You are a self-starter who is proactive and you are willing to roll up your sleeves to get the job done. • You have some experience using Legal AI tools • Your communication skills are first class, and you are able to distil complex and cumbersome legalese into understandable English. • You love tech and tools, and love exploring how they can contribute to efficiency and customer experience. • You enjoy project management and thrive on operational efficiency. • You are easy to work with, do not take yourself seriously and want to work in a fun, fast-growing and challenging environment. Bonus points if: • You speak Spanish • You have knowledge of FCA requirements or payment services. • You have experience with selling and supporting SaaS solutions. Base salary range: £71,200 - £106,800 Base salary ranges are based on role, job level, location, and market data. Please note that whilst we strive to offer competitive compensation, our approach is to pay between the minimum and the mid-point of the pay range until performance can be assessed in role. Offers will take into account level of experience, interview assessment, budgets and parity between you and fellow employees at GoCardless doing similar work. (some of) The good stuff • Wellbeing - stay healthy with dedicated support and medical cover • Work away scheme - gives you the option to work away from your country of residence for up to 90 days in any 12 month period • Adaptive Working - allows you to work flexibly, around your lifestyle • Parental leave - to suit everyone embarking on life's great adventure • Learning Budget - lead your own development with an annual learning budget • Time off - generous holiday allowance, + 3 annual volunteer days, + 4 annual business-wide wellness days (‘GC Fridays’) Life at GoCardless We're an organisation defined by our values ; We start with why before we begin any project, to ensure it’s aligned with our mission. We make it happen , working with urgency and taking personal accountability for getting things done. We act with integrity , always. We care deeply about what we do and we know it's essential that we be humble whilst we do it. Our Values form part of the GoCardless DNA, and are used to not only help us nurture and develop our culture, but to deliver impactful work that will help us to achieve our vision. Diversity & Inclusion As of April 2025, we had 806 employees (GeeCees) globally, with 524 based in the UK, 163 based in Latvia and 119 across our other offices. To ensure that we're representative of the world around us - and to be able to review relevant benchmarks - we ask GeeCees to voluntarily disclose diversity data. This year, the proportion of GeeCees providing data increased to 88% (up from 79% in 2024). With regards to diversity within GoCardless, we can see GeeCees identifying as: Asian, Black, Mixed or Other — 25% Neurodiverse — 9% LGBTQIA+ — 9% Disabled — 1% Average age — 33 Female — 45% Male — 55% We’re rooting for you during your application and GoCardless aims to provide reasonable adjustments to make our recruitment process as remarkable and accessible as we can. Please speak to your Talent Partner if you need extra support. If you want to learn more, you can read about our Employee Resource Groups and objectives here Sustainability We’re committed to reducing our impact on the environment, leaving a more sustainable world for future generations. Check out our sustainability action plan here. Find out more about Life at GoCardless via Twitter , Instagram and LinkedIn .