Senior Business Underwriting SME – Credit Risk Delivery & Audit
Posted 2 days ago by Robert Half
Negotiable
Undetermined
Remote
London Area, United Kingdom
Summary: The Senior Business Underwriting SME will leverage extensive technical expertise in manual business underwriting to ensure effective credit decision-making and robust risk governance. This role is pivotal in credit risk delivery, audit readiness, and regulatory compliance, serving as a subject matter expert on underwriting standards and risk control. The position requires collaboration with various teams to enhance underwriting practices and maintain high-quality delivery across the credit lifecycle.
Key Responsibilities:
- Perform and oversee complex manual underwriting assessments for business and commercial lending products
- Apply expert judgment to evaluate financial statements, cash flow, affordability, collateral, and risk mitigants
- Interpret and apply credit policy, risk appetite, and underwriting frameworks consistently
- Support escalation and decisioning on high-risk, non-standard, or policy-exception cases
- Provide technical guidance and mentoring to underwriters and credit analysts
- Contribute to the end-to-end delivery of credit risk initiatives, including policy changes, process enhancements, and control improvements
- Partner with Credit Risk, Operations, and Product teams to ensure underwriting practices align with strategic risk objectives
- Support implementation of new or revised underwriting standards, ensuring operational readiness
- Identify emerging risk trends and recommend actions to strengthen underwriting quality
- Act as the primary SME for internal audit, external audit, and regulatory reviews relating to business underwriting
- Support audit planning, walkthroughs, evidence provision, and issue remediation
- Assess underwriting decisions and processes against policy, regulatory expectations, and best practice
- Lead or support root cause analysis for audit findings and ensure sustainable corrective actions
- Maintain strong documentation and evidence standards to support audit and regulatory scrutiny
- Ensure underwriting activity complies with internal policies, regulatory requirements, and risk appetite
- Contribute to risk committees, governance forums, and assurance reporting where required
- Support ongoing monitoring, quality assurance, and control testing of underwriting activity
- Champion a strong risk culture and accountability across underwriting teams
Key Skills:
- Extensive experience in manual business/commercial underwriting
- Strong understanding of credit risk principles, financial analysis, and risk assessment methodologies
- Proven experience working within credit risk delivery, assurance, or audit environments
- In-depth knowledge of credit policy, controls, and regulatory expectations
- Demonstrated experience supporting or leading audit engagements (internal, external, or regulatory)
- Ability to interpret audit findings and translate them into practical risk and process improvements
- Strong attention to detail and evidence-based decisioning
Salary (Rate): undetermined
City: London Area
Country: United Kingdom
Working Arrangements: remote
IR35 Status: undetermined
Seniority Level: undetermined
Industry: Other
Senior Business Underwriting SME – Credit Risk Delivery & Audit
The Senior Business Underwriting SME will provide deep technical expertise in manual business underwriting, ensuring robust credit decisioning, strong risk governance, and high-quality delivery across the credit lifecycle. The role plays a critical part in credit risk delivery, audit readiness, and regulatory assurance, acting as a subject matter expert (SME) for underwriting standards, policy adherence, and risk control effectiveness.
Key Responsibilities
- Manual Business Underwriting Expertise
- Perform and oversee complex manual underwriting assessments for business and commercial lending products
- Apply expert judgment to evaluate financial statements, cash flow, affordability, collateral, and risk mitigants
- Interpret and apply credit policy, risk appetite, and underwriting frameworks consistently
- Support escalation and decisioning on high-risk, non-standard, or policy-exception cases
- Provide technical guidance and mentoring to underwriters and credit analysts
- Credit Risk Delivery
- Contribute to the end-to-end delivery of credit risk initiatives, including policy changes, process enhancements, and control improvements
- Partner with Credit Risk, Operations, and Product teams to ensure underwriting practices align with strategic risk objectives
- Support implementation of new or revised underwriting standards, ensuring operational readiness
- Identify emerging risk trends and recommend actions to strengthen underwriting quality
- Audit & Assurance
- Act as the primary SME for internal audit, external audit, and regulatory reviews relating to business underwriting
- Support audit planning, walkthroughs, evidence provision, and issue remediation
- Assess underwriting decisions and processes against policy, regulatory expectations, and best practice
- Lead or support root cause analysis for audit findings and ensure sustainable corrective actions
- Maintain strong documentation and evidence standards to support audit and regulatory scrutiny
- Governance & Risk Control
- Ensure underwriting activity complies with internal policies, regulatory requirements, and risk appetite
- Contribute to risk committees, governance forums, and assurance reporting where required
- Support ongoing monitoring, quality assurance, and control testing of underwriting activity
- Champion a strong risk culture and accountability across underwriting teams
Key Skills & Experience
- Technical Expertise
- Extensive experience in manual business/commercial underwriting
- Strong understanding of credit risk principles, financial analysis, and risk assessment methodologies
- Proven experience working within credit risk delivery, assurance, or audit environments
- In-depth knowledge of credit policy, controls, and regulatory expectations
- Audit & Risk Capability
- Demonstrated experience supporting or leading audit engagements (internal, external, or regulatory)
- Ability to interpret audit findings and translate them into practical risk and process improvements
- Strong attention to detail and evidence-based decisioning
Contract & Location
- Short-term contract (fixed duration)
- Remote working (UK-based)
- Must have the legal right to work in the UK (no sponsorship available)