High-Risk Underwriting Lead — Build the Playbook & Platform

PAYNOTE; Miami (FL); Hybrid; USD 110,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

PayNote in Miami, FL is seeking an Underwriting Manager to own merchant underwriting end-to-end and write the playbook. You will underwrite high-risk merchants hands-on from day one while shaping the underwriting process, risk policy, and the systems that power the PayNote platform.

As volume grows, you will hire and lead a small underwriting team, translate policy into product requirements, and define decision logic and analytics to drive measurable improvements.

Qualifications

• 5+ years in merchant/payments underwriting, with meaningful experience in high-risk verticals (ISO, PSP, payfac, or acquiring bank).
• 1+ years leading people or owning an underwriting function.
• Working knowledge of card-brand high-risk programs, MATCH/TMF, NACHA rules, KYC/KYB/AML requirements.
• Proven track record of building or significantly improving an underwriting process.
• Comfort working with product and engineering: writing requirements, defining decision logic, evaluating data vendors.

Responsibilities

• Underwrite (hands-on): Review and decision new merchant applications in high-risk verticals.
• Perform KYC/KYB, beneficial-ownership, credit, processing-history, and website/business-model reviews.
• Set reserves, processing limits, and pricing-risk terms; run periodic re-underwriting of the existing portfolio.
• Build the system: design underwriting policy from scratch, create decisioning rules, and plan data-vendor integrations.
• Translate policy into product requirements and ship underwriting tooling with measurable metrics.
• Lead: hire, train, and manage underwriters as volume scales; own KPIs and report portfolio risk.

Skills

Merchant underwriting

High-risk verticals

Leadership

KYC/KYB

SQL/Excel

Policy design

Automation thinking

Tools

KYC tooling

Fraud monitoring tools

Job description

PayNote in Miami, FL is seeking an Underwriting Manager to own merchant underwriting end-to-end and write the playbook. You will underwrite high-risk merchants hands-on from day one while shaping the underwriting process, risk policy, and the systems that power the PayNote platform.

As volume grows, you will hire and lead a small underwriting team, translate policy into product requirements, and define decision logic and analytics to drive measurable improvements.