Senior Expected Credit Loss Specialist

🏗 We're Hiring: Senior Expected Credit Loss Specialist

📍 Location: United Arab Emirates (Remote)

🕒 Employment Type: Full-Time

💼 Experience Level: Mid-Level to Senior

🌐 Work Arrangement: Fully Remote

About Us

We are a construction-focused organization committed to delivering complex projects through disciplined financial management, effective credit risk oversight, strong governance, and collaborative project execution. Our multidisciplinary teams work across Project Management, Construction, Engineering, Procurement, Commercial, Legal, Finance, Human Resources, Design, Quality, HSE, Consultants, Contractors, Suppliers, Logistics, Administration, Information Technology, and Executive Leadership to maintain financial stability, strengthen risk controls, and support sustainable business growth.

We recognize the importance of accurate credit risk assessment, forward-looking financial analysis, and appropriate impairment recognition in protecting organizational assets and supporting sound financial decisions. Through robust expected credit loss methodologies, reliable financial data, and effective internal controls, we aim to identify potential credit deterioration, improve loss forecasting, and maintain compliance with applicable accounting standards and regulatory requirements.

The Role

We are seeking an experienced Senior Expected Credit Loss Specialist to oversee the calculation, analysis, validation, reporting, and continuous improvement of Expected Credit Loss (ECL) models and impairment assessment processes. The successful candidate will support the implementation and application of IFRS 9 expected credit loss requirements, including the assessment of probability of default (PD), loss given default (LGD), exposure at default (EAD), forward-looking economic scenarios, and significant increases in credit risk.

The role will collaborate with Finance, Credit Risk, Treasury, Commercial, Procurement, Legal, Project Management, and senior management to ensure appropriate impairment recognition across relevant financial assets, receivables, contract-related balances, and other exposures within the applicable accounting framework. The ideal candidate will have strong expertise in credit risk modeling, financial analysis, model validation, data governance, and financial reporting, with knowledge of relevant United Arab Emirates regulatory expectations where applicable.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and support the calculation, assessment, monitoring, and reporting of expected credit losses across relevant financial assets and credit exposures.
• Implement, maintain, and enhance ECL methodologies in accordance with IFRS 9 and applicable accounting policies.
• Assess the classification of financial assets into the appropriate impairment measurement stages based on credit risk deterioration and applicable accounting requirements.
• Evaluate Stage 1, Stage 2, and Stage 3 exposures and determine the appropriate expected credit loss measurement approach.
• Calculate and analyze probability of default (PD), loss given default (LGD), and exposure at default (EAD) parameters used in ECL models.
• Assess whether significant increases in credit risk have occurred since initial recognition using approved quantitative and qualitative criteria.
• Monitor credit deterioration indicators, payment behavior, delinquency trends, counterparty risk ratings, and other relevant warning signals.
• Support the identification of defaulted, credit-impaired, and potentially distressed exposures in accordance with approved definitions.
• Develop, review, and maintain methodologies for 12-month and lifetime expected credit loss calculations.
• Apply appropriate forward-looking information and macroeconomic scenarios to estimate expected credit losses.
• Evaluate the impact of economic variables, including GDP growth, interest rates, inflation, unemployment, exchange rates, and relevant industry conditions, on credit risk estimates.
• Assess the weighting of baseline, favorable, and adverse economic scenarios using documented methodologies and appropriate governance approvals.
• Perform sensitivity analysis to evaluate how changes in economic assumptions, model parameters, and scenario weights affect ECL outcomes.
• Review the reasonableness of management overlays and post-model adjustments, ensuring they are supported by evidence, appropriately approved, and transparently documented.
• Assess the adequacy of ECL allowances and identify material movements requiring investigation or management attention.
• Analyze changes in impairment provisions arising from portfolio growth, changes in credit quality, model parameter updates, economic conditions, and changes in exposure composition.
• Prepare detailed ECL reconciliations and explain material differences between reporting periods.
• Support impairment assessments for trade receivables, contract assets, loans, deposits, intercompany balances, and other relevant financial assets, subject to applicable accounting requirements.
• Evaluate the credit risk associated with customers, suppliers, contractors, subcontractors, consultants, and other commercial counterparties.
• Analyze aging profiles, overdue balances, payment histories, disputes, and collection trends to support credit loss estimates.
• Assess the recoverability of receivables arising from construction projects, contractual milestones, retention amounts, and other project-related commercial arrangements.
• Coordinate with Commercial and Project Management teams to understand disputed invoices, delayed certifications, contract variations, payment delays, and other factors affecting receivable recoverability.
• Work with Finance and Accounts Receivable teams to reconcile outstanding balances, impairment records, write-offs, recoveries, and supporting financial data.
• Evaluate relevant collateral, guarantees, insurance arrangements, credit enhancements, and recovery expectations when assessing LGD, where applicable.
• Review the appropriateness of recovery assumptions, expected recovery timing, discounting, and other material model inputs.
• Support the assessment of credit risk concentrations by customer, industry, geographic market, counterparty type, and other relevant categories.
• Maintain accurate records of exposure classifications, risk parameters, impairment calculations, model assumptions, and supporting documentation.
• Ensure ECL calculations are reproducible, traceable, and supported by reliable source data and documented methodologies.
• Reconcile ECL model outputs with the general ledger, subledgers, credit risk systems, and financial reporting records.
• Investigate discrepancies between credit risk data, accounting records, portfolio information, and reported impairment balances.
• Establish and maintain data quality controls for customer information, exposure balances, delinquency data, risk ratings, collateral records, and repayment histories.
• Coordinate with Information Technology, Data Management, Finance, and Risk teams to improve data availability, integrity, and consistency.
• Support the development and maintenance of automated ECL calculation tools, reporting systems, and analytical dashboards.
• Perform user acceptance testing for enhancements to ECL systems, data interfaces, calculation engines, and financial reporting applications.
• Document model assumptions, methodologies, data sources, calculation procedures, limitations, and implementation changes.
• Support the development and periodic review of credit impairment policies, procedures, control frameworks, and operating standards.
• Ensure ECL processes are consistent with applicable accounting standards, internal policies, and relevant regulatory requirements.
• Monitor changes to IFRS 9 guidance, accounting interpretations, and applicable UAE regulatory expectations that may affect impairment practices.
• Assess the impact of regulatory and accounting changes on ECL methodologies, reporting processes, model assumptions, and control requirements.
• Coordinate with Finance and Regulatory Reporting teams to ensure impairment information is accurately reflected in financial statements and relevant regulatory submissions.
• Prepare supporting schedules, disclosures, reconciliations, and explanatory analysis for expected credit loss reporting.
• Support month-end, quarter-end, and year-end financial close activities involving impairment calculations and credit loss provisions.
• Coordinate with external auditors, internal auditors, and independent model reviewers regarding ECL methodologies, assumptions, calculations, and supporting evidence.
• Prepare audit documentation covering model governance, scenario selection, parameter estimation, staging assessments, overlays, and impairment movements.
• Investigate audit findings and coordinate corrective action plans to address identified deficiencies.
• Support independent model validation and periodic reviews of ECL models, including conceptual soundness, performance, calibration, and implementation accuracy.
• Conduct back-testing and benchmarking, where appropriate, to compare model estimates with observed defaults, realized losses, recoveries, and portfolio outcomes.
• Identify model limitations, data gaps, estimation uncertainty, and potential sources of bias in ECL calculations.
• Recommend model enhancements and control improvements to strengthen accuracy, reliability, and transparency.
• Monitor portfolio performance and identify emerging credit risk trends that may affect expected loss estimates.
• Conduct scenario analysis and stress testing to evaluate the potential impact of adverse economic conditions on impairment provisions.
• Assess the effects of customer concentration, industry downturns, contractor distress, supply chain disruption, and market volatility on relevant credit exposures.
• Collaborate with Credit Risk and Commercial teams to review high-risk counterparties and significant exposures requiring enhanced monitoring.