Consumer Loan Underwriter (I, II, Senior)

**Who We Are** *We have the fundamental belief that we, as an organization, can and will improve lives. Rooted in the centuries-old credit union philosophy of people helping people, we maintain a simple premise. Those we interact with will receive equal and just treatment, devoid of intolerance, false judgment, racism, or discrimination of any kind. We must not accept less if we are to fulfill our mission, "We Improve Lives." This mission empowers us to serve the greater good and to make a difference in our world. Our cooperative structure creates a cycle of mutual assistance towards the common goal of the financial well-being of members.* *At Black Hills Federal Credit Union (BHFCU), we’re committed to improving the lives of our members every day, and we look for people who share that passion. Don’t have a ton of financial industry experience? No problem. Our onboarding includes an orientation program with ongoing training to help staff further their career at BHFCU by building on their existing strengths.* **General Purpose:** Assess risk by analyzing third-party credit and financial information. Determine loan eligibility using internal criteria and metrics. Approve, deny, or counteroffer loans, and communicate decisions via loan systems and vendor APIs. **Essential Duties/Responsibilities:** - Assess credit risk on incoming applications in both Symitar and MeridianLink. - Determine financial eligibility for credit using specified limits. - Complete income verification or financial document analysis of paystubs, income statements and tax returns when necessary. - Monitor and adapt to changes in lending legislation and institutional guidelines to support compliant and informed decision-making. - Ensure loan production and decision-making align with team benchmarks and performance standards. - Ensure credit decisions are accurate and well documented. - Consistently meet or surpass performance expectations established by the Credit Union, department, and individual objectives. - Make sound and detailed recommendations on loans outside of specified limits. - Utilize lending tools to evaluate collateral value and assign finance limits to the loan within determined limits. - Consistent monitoring and actively engaged in working underwriting queues to ensure timely action is taken on all requests. - Participate in peer loan review. Collaborate with fellow underwriters to review loan decisions for consistency and alignment with lending policies. This process serves as an internal control mechanism to ensure sound lending practices and uniform decision-making across the team. - Make informed lending decisions by thoroughly evaluating financial data, assessing borrower creditworthiness, and analyzing loan structure. Ensure all underwriting actions adhere to federal and state regulations—including but not limited to ECOA, FCRA, TILA—as well as internal lending policies and risk guidelines. - Exercise independent lending authority within approved limits and manage escalations for complex or borderline applications. Provide clear rationale and documentation for decisions and collaborate with senior leadership on exceptions or overrides. - Support audit preparation and contribute to quality control strategies that enhance consistency, accuracy, and long-term portfolio integrity. - Monitor loan performance trends through reporting and contribute to portfolio risk management strategies. **Other Duties/Responsibilities:** - Research account information or discrepancies to include follow up for information correction as needed. - Perform other duties as assigned by the Consumer Loan Underwriting Manager and VP of Consumer Lending. **Job Knowledge:** - The ability to work within the consumer lending operating system, credit union core system and all internal internet and reference sites. - Maintain an updated job knowledge of consumer lending products, policies and procedures. - Maintain an updated knowledge of the full scope of credit union…