Senior Underwriter in London

LHV Bank Limited is a UK-licensed bank operating across three core business segments: Retail Banking, SME Lending, and Banking Services (Baa S).

The bank is a wholly owned subsidiary of LHV Group, a listed financial services provider headquartered in Estonia.

LHV Bank operates under a full UK banking licence granted in May 2023.

The Bank supports over 200 fintech clients with embedded financial infrastructure, provides retail savings products via digital channels, and offers SME credit solutions across the UK.

In line with its regulatory responsibilities and growth ambitions, LHV Bank is committed to maintaining a robust and proportionate financial crime control environment.

Expanding our services, LHV Bank now provides personal banking solutions.

Our offerings include current accounts with competitive interest rates, fixed-rate bonds for long-term savings, and debit cards.

Customers can conveniently access these services through the LHV App, enabling secure account opening and management.

Role

We are looking for a Senior Underwriter to join us at this exciting time in our growth as we look to scale a lending portfolio.

• Please note this is a predominantly office-based role in London
• The Senior Underwriter provides a lead role to the underwriting activities of the SME Lending team making recommendations, analysing counterparties, ensuring strong serviceability and collateral.
• Coverage of Trading Businesses for owner Occupied commercial property backed lending (Industrial, Care Homes, Nurseries, Hotels, Retail), Commercial Real Estate (Investment) and Buy to Let Lending on transactions up to £5m per counterparty (with scope to increase to £10m).
• The role holder contributes to an environment in which lending is conducted on sound commercial and professional principles which supports colleagues, customers and the corporate objectives of the organisation.

Key Responsibilities include

• Leads the Implementation of the Credit Strategy in line with the Board’s Risk appetite, policies and corporate governance.
• Ensuring that strong levels of professional conduct, integrity and values are respected through the Underwriting team and standards.
• Setting and maintaining robust lending standards in line with industry guidelines and expectations.
• Ensuring the delivery favourable customer outcomes in terms of credit assessment and experience.
• Supporting, coaching and developing the underwriting team to the highest of standards.
• Supporting the front-line team in achieving objective and managing risk.
• The writing of underwriting papers for submission to credit committee.
• Presenting and supporting cases at Credit committee.
• Monitoring performance across the portfolio including in-life events, deteriorating trends and defaults.
• Setting and oversight of appropriate covenants and conditions.
• Working with the Director of Credit, Underwriters and stakeholders in relation to the oversight process for the portfolio.
• Reviewing existing transactions periodically and annual reviews

Skills and Experience required

• Significant prior experience within Underwriting on significant deal sizes with an associated mandate.
• Prior experience of the credit and economic cycle is beneficial including involvement in Annual Reviews, Covenant Monitoring, Watchlist, Collections and Restructuring cases.
• Ideally knowledge and experience within Banking or Financial Services.
• Strong analytical and numerical skills including working with Data Visualisation tools.
• Previous experience of writing policies and reports.
• Excellent Stakeholder Management skills.
• Some of our benefits (only applicable to UK based roles not Internship programmes)
• Competitive salary &lots of opportunities to learn, grow and progress professionally.
• Open and inclusive culture.
• Hybrid working.
• Fantastic offices and great working environment.
• Vitality Health Plan (includes private health insurance, travel insurance, gym discounts)
• Health cash Plan (Medicash health plan Level 3)
• 6% employer pension contribution.
• Life assurance – 4 x salary.
• Income protection insurance – 75%
• 28 days holiday plus 3 additional days, & further days for various key life events as well as the opportunity to sell up to 5 days per calendar year.
• Swap public/bank holidays each year for alternative days that align with your personal, cultural, or religious observances.
• Enhanced family friendly and family forming policies.
• Access to a wide range of retail discounts.
• Team Socials.