Credit or Loans Officer
What the work is
Analyses, evaluates and processes credit and loan applications.
Would you enjoy the work?
These are the main tasks in the official description. Mark how each one sounds to you.
- Analyses information about customers, and examines references, credit ratings, investment risks, pay slips and other information against predetermined policy standards
- Contacts financial and credit institutions to obtain information about customers
- Prepares papers setting out conditions of credit and loans, rates of repayments and loan periods, and provides information about customers' standing to financial and credit institutions
- Authorises the approval of credit and loan applications, and recommends credit and loan conditions and limits
- Keeps records of payments, and prepares routine letters requesting payment for overdue accounts and forwards these for legal action
- Answers enquiries concerning credit standing of customers, loan balances and penalties
- May recommend, approve and arrange mortgages
Try it
A simulation and a case study from this kind of work, set in the lending team at a mid-sized lender that offers personal and home loans. They are fictional.
The kind of days you could have
Good days
- A family you helped gets the loan that makes their home possible
- You spot an error in a file before it goes any further
- A hard no is explained so kindly that the customer thanks you
Hard days
- A sales colleague pushes you to approve something that is not quite right
- You have to decline someone whose story you believe
- A queue of files, each hiding one detail that could change everything
Written by Career Calling as a general guide. Real roles vary by employer and place.
Work a mission
Step into a simulated workplace in this field, with a brief from your manager.
Description and tasks: Australian Bureau of Statistics, Occupation Standard Classification for Australia, 2024, Version 1.0 (opens another site), occupation 531231, used under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. The skill guide above is our plain English summary.