Senior Retail Credit Risk Officer

Alterna Savings•Ottawa, ON

7d•CA$65,000 - CA$75,000

About The Position

The Senior Retail Credit Risk Officer is responsible for independently assessing retail credit quality, underwriting practices, and policy compliance across the organization through ongoing post-funding reviews of retail loans, lines of credit, and mortgages. This role serves as a key second-line oversight function within Risk Management, helping to identify emerging risks, evaluate adherence to internal policies and regulatory requirements, and support the consistent application of sound lending practices across all business channels. By completing detailed credit assessments on a representative sample of retail credit advanced each month, the Officer provides objective insight into portfolio quality, exception management, documentation standards, and decision accuracy. This position plays an important role in protecting the organization from credit losses by identifying control weaknesses, policy gaps, and process inconsistencies, and recommending practical actions to strengthen underwriting quality and mitigate risk. The incumbent serves as a subject matter resource to lending personnel and management, provides reporting and trend analysis to senior leadership, and contributes to the continuous improvement of retail credit policies, procedures, training, and risk practices. Success in this role requires sound judgment, strong analytical capability, regulatory awareness, and the ability to communicate findings clearly and constructively in support of prudent growth and effective risk governance.

Requirements

Post-secondary education in a discipline relevant to the role, combined with a minimum of five years of senior-level credit-granting experience.
Significant experience in credit analysis, reporting, and professional report writing.
Strong knowledge of the Credit Unions and Caisses Populaires Act and the Bank Act.
Familiarity with regulatory requirements applicable to Alterna Savings and Alterna Bank.
Strong knowledge of credit operations, controls, and assessment techniques.
Awareness of emerging trends and practices across credit unions and other lending institutions.
Demonstrated ability to manage multiple priorities and adapt to changing business needs.
Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel.
Exercises initiative, tact, discretion, and sound judgment while managing deadlines and building effective working relationships.
Strong analytical, critical-thinking, and data-interpretation skills.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
Ability to work independently, improve processes, and apply a practical, solutions-focused mindset.
Curious, adaptable, and quick to learn in a changing regulatory environment.
Strong problem-solving skills and sound professional judgment.

Responsibilities

Provides expert, practical guidance across the organization and serves as a resource to credit representatives.
Responsible for recommending actions to mitigate risk on individual files and watchlist accounts.
Recommends enhancements to lending policies and procedures based on assessment findings.
Recommends training, tools, or job aids to strengthen compliance with credit requirements.
Completes detailed credit assessments on a minimum of 10% of disbursed retail loans, lines of credit, and mortgages to evaluate underwriting accuracy, policy compliance, and the identification and approval of exceptions across each branch and business channel.
Follows up on credit assessments to ensure identified issues are addressed by third-party underwriters, branch personnel, and branch management, and that risk is mitigated appropriately.
Provides reporting on credit assessment findings to senior management, highlighting areas requiring improvement and recommending actions where performance is below expectations.
Maintains awareness of current regulatory and industry trends affecting Alterna’s retail credit activities.
Participates in formal and informal meetings to resolve issues and ensure consistency of approach.
Provides expert guidance to credit representatives and other staff, and responds to questions related to retail credit policy, processes, procedures, the credit assessment process, and funding activities.
Promotes teamwork within the department to support knowledge sharing and consistent practices.
Complies with all policies and procedures to maintain a safe and healthy work environment.
Supports special credit-related projects by performing activities that maintain operational integrity.
Performs all other duties as assigned by Retail Credit Risk Management