Designing for speed, accuracy, and confidence in financing decisions.
Spruce Finance’s underwriting team played a critical role in reviewing and approving financing applications for solar and energy-efficiency projects. However, the tools they relied on were complex and slowed down both training and day-to-day work. My role as UX/UI Designer was to streamline the underwriting process, making it faster for team members to review applications, apply consistent standards, and communicate approvals.
Challenges
- Underwriters needed to evaluate multiple data points across different systems, which created inefficiencies.
- New team members faced a steep learning curve, increasing training time and delaying productivity.
- Slow responses from underwriting created bottlenecks in the sales pipeline, frustrating both sales reps and homeowners.
Design Improvements
Working closely with the underwriting leadership team, I focused on creating a more intuitive, guided workflow:
- Simplified interfaces that grouped related information logically, reducing screen-switching.
- Clearer workflows with step-by-step guidance for common tasks, enabling new underwriters to get up to speed faster.
- Error reduction through input validation and clearer data presentation, which helped ensure consistent decisions.
Impact
- Faster response times: More applications reviewed and approved daily.
- Improved training: New underwriters reached proficiency more quickly.
- Sales pipeline acceleration: By reducing underwriting delays, sales reps could close deals and move projects forward sooner.