Former Wells Fargo EVP Colleen Taylor Joins American Express

Colleen Taylor, a Wells Fargo alum, will join American Express as the company’s new president of merchant services, a press release announced.

In her new role, Taylor will report to Global Merchant and Network Services President Anré Williams. She will “lead the organization that acquires and manages the relationships with the millions of merchants that accept American Express across the U.S.,” per the release.

Williams said Taylor’s previous experience with Wells Fargo would be an asset.

“With 30 years of experience in banking, merchant and B2B industries, Taylor is a seasoned, strategic leader who brings broad and deep expertise, along with a valuable external perspective, to American Express,” Williams said. “She is the ideal person to build on the momentum we have in our U.S. merchant business and fuel its growth into the future.”

Taylor worked with Wells Fargo as the executive vice president of merchant services, where she oversaw the strategic direction, financial management and leadership of the bank’s merchant services business. She also worked as the executive vice president at Mastercard, where she managed product development and growth for the North American chapter of the company for fields like B2B, government and emerging payments.

Taylor has also worked at Capital One, Wachovia Bank and J.P.Morgan Chase.

Taylor said she views her new position as a way to get involved in the new, more complex world of payments.

“The payments landscape has grown in complexity with the move to digitization, [with] many more key stakeholders involved in the end-to-end processing of a transaction,” Taylor said, according to the release. “I look forward to joining American Express and helping to continue to drive innovation and deliver differentiated products, services and capabilities to our merchant and acquiring partners.”

American Express has seen revenues fall drastically due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with reductions in consumer services, commercial services, merchant services and more.