In this episode of Cards Against Complexity, Jan speaks with Samuel Comerford, VP of Operations at Unzer—a payment company formed through the merger of 13 fintech businesses. Sam shares insights into how Unzer is streamlining complexity across systems, teams, and products to create a unified customer experience, and what this means for the future of service in financial services.

Key Takeaways:

• Merging 13 Companies into One Unified Service:Unzer’s journey brings together 13 independent payment companies into a single operation, offering both online and offline payment solutions, software, and cash register systems. Sam explains the operational challenges of aligning separate teams, tech stacks, and service models—and how success depends more on unifying culture and behavior than on tech integration alone.

• AI Is a Baseline, Not a Differentiator:Sam views AI adoption in customer service as essential hygiene. From surfacing relevant content to enabling faster issue resolution, AI is a tool that every serious fintech should already be implementing. The real differentiation comes after AI—when edge cases require human empathy, rapid response, and ownership. Businesses must know where automation stops and human service takes over.

• Data Fluency Is the Skillset for the Future:For operations and service professionals, Sam emphasizes the growing importance of data skills. Understanding how to merge, interpret, and act on complex data sets—especially in post-merger environments—is critical. He advocates for building internal “control towers” to monitor customer experience in real time and identify when systems are failing or when manual intervention is needed.

This episode is great for anyone in financial services navigating post-merger integration, scaling service operations, or planning their AI strategy.