Vice President, US, Customer Acquisition Risk Strategy

• A seasoned credit risk leader with deep expertise in consumer lending, including new customer acquisition strategies, pricing, underwriting, and lifetime value optimization
• A collaborative, people-first operator who uses data to drive credit and fraud strategy, partners effectively across functions, and champions experimentation, innovation, and advanced analytics to enable sustainable growth
• Remote-first opportunity for US-based employees with the option to work in-person out of our Manhattan office

Start your adventure with Zip 

Join Zip’s New Customer Acquisition Risk team, responsible for approving new customers, allocating initial spending power, and optimizing the sign-up funnel to enhance customer experience and drive merchant value. As Vice President, US Customer Acquisition Risk Strategy, you’ll lead credit strategies that shape customer lifetime value overseeing approval logic, identity verification, initial exposure decisions, and pricing inputs. You’ll scale risk capabilities, integrate alternative and cash flow data, and ensure our credit decisions remain responsive to customer needs and market dynamics.

This role is highly cross-functional and analytically rigorous. You’ll work closely with Product, Engineering, Data Science, Finance, and Compliance to execute on high-impact strategies and influence Zip’s risk appetite. You’ll lead a high-performing, distributed team, using advanced analytics to surface insights and continuously improve performance. Your work will directly impact Zip’s ability to acquire the right customers, manage risk effectively, and grow profitably in the US market.

Interesting problems you’ll get to solve

 

Strategy & Decisioning

• Define and evolve Zip’s lifetime value framework for new accounts, integrating market dynamics, macroeconomic factors, and customer behavior insights to inform underwriting and pricing strategies
• Set and evolve approval, identity verification, and initial exposure strategies for US customers
• Optimize initial credit exposure decisions balancing transaction volume and losses
• Guide pricing and exposure strategies in partnership with Product and Finance
• Establish capabilities and strategies for cash flow underwriting for new customers
• Ensure compliance with relevant regulations (e.g., FCRA, Reg Z) in credit strategy design

Analytics & Experimentation

• Design and execute A/B and champion/challenger tests to refine credit decisioning
• Oversee portfolio-level sensitivity analysis to assess risk exposure across a range of economic and policy scenarios, informing executive-level decision-making
• Oversee loss rate forecasting and credit funnel conversion monitoring
• Collaborate with Data Science to apply and improve risk models and underwriting logic
• Partner with Data Science for continuous improvement of risk assessment models

AI Integration

• Embed AI into operational workflows (e.g., data triage, decision logic validation, report automation) to increase scale and reduce time-to-insight
• Validate and apply AI outputs in a way that supports sound credit decisions — avoiding abstract models or unsupported insights

Team Leadership & Development

• Lead an existing, distributed team across US and offshore locations, with full accountability for performance, development, and delivery
• Build team capacity and ownership structures to support rapid experimentation and iterative model updates
• Drive structured career development, prioritization frameworks, and quality standards across the team
• Manage and develop analysts to drive strategic changes
• Create consistent frameworks for training, mentoring, and calibrating team members on experimentation, monitoring, and communication
• Develop talent and structure within an onshore and offshore team model

 

What you’ll bring to the team 

 

Experience & Domain Expertise

• 15+ years of experience in credit or fraud risk strategy in financial services or fintech
• Direct experience with cash flow underwriting, including integration of transaction-level data into credit decisioning
• Experience deploying underwriting and identity decisioning in real-time systems
• Experience deploying underwriting and identity decisioning in real-time systems
• Experience with regulatory compliance, such as FCRA and Reg Z 
• Quantitative background in engineering, statistics, math, economics, business, or related disciplines

Technical & Analytical Skills

• Expert-level SQL require