AI May Run Payments but Humans Still Own the Risk

Confidence in AI depends on strong governance and explainability, WEX Chief Risk and Compliance Officer Annie Drew writes in a new PYMNTS eBook, “AI Runs Payments. Governance Decides What Happens Next.”

Artificial intelligence is becoming more deeply embedded in how the payments industry operates. It helps identify fraud patterns, support faster decisions and manage growing volumes of transactions and data. But as AI becomes more involved in financial systems, the question facing the industry is shifting. It is no longer just about deploying AI. It is about governing it in a way that protects trust, supports durable outcomes at scale, and enables more confident decision-making.

AI systems influence financial access, fraud outcomes and customer confidence. Governance cannot be a technical afterthought; it must be built into the design from day one. Much like the emergence of GDPR for data privacy, risk and compliance professionals now play a vital role in shaping AI frameworks.

In practice, governance often breaks down during the transition from experimentation to real-world use. Many organizations have strong frameworks around model development and testing, but those controls can weaken once systems begin interacting with live transactions and external data. AI models do not operate in a vacuum. Governance has to be built for that dynamic environment, not layered on after the fact, if organizations want those systems to perform reliably at scale.

At WEX, this is especially important. Our role in the payments ecosystem involves connecting businesses, suppliers and financial institutions across complex transaction flows. AI can help strengthen those systems by identifying anomalies faster, improving payment security and supporting better decision-making. But the value only holds if the underlying governance is strong enough to support it. Confidence in AI depends on strong governance and explainability, alongside systems that deliver reliable, transparent outcomes and experiences people can trust.

One of the most difficult challenges organizations face in building that confidence is balancing speed with oversight. Payments companies compete on efficiency, and businesses expect transactions to move securely. AI can support those goals, but deploying capabilities without clear governance introduces risk and limits the ability to scale over time. The answer is not slowing innovation. It is building governance processes that move at the same pace as technology. That includes clear accountability for models, strong collaboration between product, design, risk, compliance and technology teams, and consistent monitoring once systems are live.

This level of complexity and scale is why AI cannot sit solely within engineering or data science teams. Decisions about models affect regulatory obligations, fraud prevention strategies, customer trust, and business outcomes. Bringing business leaders, product and design teams, risk partners and technologists into a shared governance framework early helps avoid blind spots later.

The future of artificial intelligence is not about full automation. It is about collaboration between AI and human decision-makers to drive smarter outcomes, with humans remaining accountable for the decisions that matter most. And as AI becomes more central to how the industry operates, the companies that succeed will be the ones that treat governance not as a constraint, but as a foundation for responsible innovation, scalable execution and long-term trust.