Hardship Specialist

Job Description

Upstart is seeking a candidate to fill a Hardship Specialis t role. As a Hardship Specialist, you are part of a team that’s responsible for delivering great customer experience, contributing to portfolio performance, improving process efficiency, and ensuring program compliance. You will help build an optimal strategy for customer outreach, review and implement quality assurance procedures to ensure workflow and processes are compliant and perform in-depth investigations for suspicious activity reporting. As part of Upstart’s Hardship Team, you will also assist with some aspects of loan repayments and servicing; this includes providing customer service to borrowers, contacting past due accounts, performing research, and improving Upstart’s servicing process to exceed industry performance.

An ideal candidate is customer-focused, possesses critical thinking skills, and loves solving problems. He/She has a detective mindset, is curious about root causes, and handles challenges with positivity and grit. He/She is also detail-oriented, self-motivated, and is able to make independent decisions with good judgment.

Here’s more about what you’ll be doing:

The Hardship Team is mainly responsible for assisting customers who are facing unexpected and difficult life events and are temporarily unable to make regular payments on their loan. The team’s responsibilities include:

• Responding to inquiries from customers regarding eligibility requirements, benefits for enrolling in the program and the application process.
• Reaching out to customers who are eligible for the hardship program.
• Reviewing submitted applications and following up on missing details and/or documents.
• Presenting hardship decisions/options to the customers.

Here is what we are looking for:

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent work experience
• Demonstrate ability to think critically, root cause problems by analyzing data, and recommend solutions
• Demonstrate ability to effectively negotiate and deliver results
• Demonstrate ability to understand borrowers’ situations, empathize with their challenges, and effectively communicate Upstart’s solutions and procedures to help them
• Exemplify Upstart values such as positivity, grit, customer focus, and teamwork at all times
• Perform effectively in a high volume and fast-paced environment with a high degree of accuracy and productivity
• Must have strong verbal / writing skills and able to present information in a clear manner
• Strong team player, prioritizing the needs of the customer and team over the needs of the self
• Ability to handle confidential financial information appropriately