Loan Origination
System Redesign
Republic Finance operates 900+ lending branches across the US South. I was brought in as Senior UX Designer to redesign the internal loan origination system — the tool branch officers use every day to create, capture, and submit consumer loan applications.
Company
Republic Finance
Role
Senior UX Designer
Scope
Internal Tool · Loan Origination · UX Redesign
Timeline
2022 – 2023
| App ID | Borrower | Co-Borrower | Amount | Type | Status | Officer | Branch | Updated | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RF-2023-4422 | Rivera, Marcus | Rivera, Elena | $10,000 | Personal | Pending Review | John M. | BTR Main | 2h ago | |
| RF-2023-4421 | Martinez, Carlos | — | $8,500 | Personal | Pending Review | John M. | BTR Main | 3h ago | |
| RF-2023-4420 | Johnson, Patricia | Johnson, Mark | $12,200 | Auto | Approved | John M. | BTR Main | 5h ago | |
| RF-2023-4419 | Williams, David | — | $5,000 | Personal | Under Review | Sarah K. | BTR North | 6h ago | |
| RF-2023-4418 | Thompson, Angela | Thompson, Roy | $15,000 | Personal | Under Review | John M. | BTR Main | Yesterday | |
| RF-2023-4416 | Garcia, Robert | — | $3,200 | Personal | Declined | Sarah K. | BTR North | Yesterday | |
| RF-2023-4415 | Davis, Michelle | Davis, Paul | $9,800 | Auto | Approved | John M. | BTR Main | Nov 13 | |
| RF-2023-4412 | Brown, Stephanie | — | $6,500 | Personal | Funded | Sarah K. | BTR North | Nov 13 |
The Context
Branch lending.
High stakes. High volume.
Republic Finance is a consumer lender with 900+ branches. Every loan starts with a branch officer sitting across from a borrower, entering their information into the LOS. Get the UX wrong and you slow every transaction across every branch, every day.
The product
An internal branch tool — not customer-facing. Loan officers use it to originate consumer and personal loans in person, capturing borrower data and submitting to underwriters.
The problem
Fragmented workflow, redundant data entry fields, and no clear progression between steps. Officers were losing time on every application — and errors in the data were causing downstream underwriting issues.
The brief
Redesign the full origination flow — from application lookup through borrower, income, co-borrower, assets, vehicles, and underwriter submission — as a coherent, efficient single-system experience.
My Approach
Designed, prototyped,
validated — before dev.
The entire 8-step origination flow was designed in Figma and made interactive with Figma Make — branch staff walked through the full application before engineering wrote a single line of code.
Figma Make
Used Figma Make to build an end-to-end interactive prototype of the loan origination flow — co-borrower toggle logic, multi-vehicle add/remove, and auto-generated loan summary terms — all interactive, all before engineering involvement. Branch officers validated the full flow in a single session.
Workflow shadowing
Worked alongside branch loan officers and operations leads to map the actual origination workflow — every field, every handoff, every point where officers had to leave the system to find or re-enter information.
Figma Make prototype
Built the full 8-step flow as an interactive Figma Make prototype. Branch staff validated co-borrower toggling, multi-vehicle capture, and auto-generated loan terms before any engineering resource was allocated.
Spec for engineering
Delivered annotated Figma specs covering component states, form validation rules, conditional logic (co-borrower toggle, vehicle financing fields), and all auto-calculation formulas — zero ambiguity for the development team.
The Screens
8 screens.
One end-to-end flow.
From application lookup through underwriter submission — the complete redesigned branch LOS.
| App ID | Borrower | Amount | Type | Status | Officer | Date | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RF-2023-4421 | Martinez, Carlos | $8,500 | Personal | Pending Review | John M. | Nov 14 | |
| RF-2023-4420 | Johnson, Patricia | $12,200 | Auto | Approved | John M. | Nov 14 | |
| RF-2023-4418 | Williams, David | $5,000 | Personal | Funded | Sarah K. | Nov 13 | |
| RF-2023-4415 | Thompson, Angela | $15,000 | Personal | Under Review | John M. | Nov 13 | |
| RF-2023-4412 | Garcia, Robert | $3,200 | Personal | Declined | Sarah K. | Nov 12 | |
| RF-2023-4409 | Davis, Michelle | $9,800 | Auto | Approved | John M. | Nov 12 |
Application search, branch stats, recent submissions at a glance
Personal, contact, and employment — grouped in logical panels
| Income Source | Type | Gross Monthly | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gulf Coast Industries | Salary | $5,416.67 | ✓ Pay stub |
Income sources, verification status, combined monthly total
Toggle on/off — mirrors borrower structure, shows combined income
Financial assets table + vehicle cards with financing status
Auto-generated loan terms, DTI gauge, application recap — one-click submit to underwriter
Full application packet with decision panel, risk score, and notes
| App ID | Borrower | Co-Borrower | Amount | Type | Status | Officer | Branch | Updated | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RF-2023-4422 | Rivera, Marcus | Rivera, Elena | $10,000 | Personal | Pending Review | John M. | BTR Main | 2h ago | |
| RF-2023-4421 | Martinez, Carlos | — | $8,500 | Personal | Pending Review | John M. | BTR Main | 3h ago | |
| RF-2023-4420 | Johnson, Patricia | Johnson, Mark | $12,200 | Auto | Approved | John M. | BTR Main | 5h ago | |
| RF-2023-4419 | Williams, David | — | $5,000 | Personal | Under Review | Sarah K. | BTR North | 6h ago | |
| RF-2023-4418 | Thompson, Angela | Thompson, Roy | $15,000 | Personal | Under Review | John M. | BTR Main | Yesterday | |
| RF-2023-4416 | Garcia, Robert | — | $3,200 | Personal | Declined | Sarah K. | BTR North | Yesterday | |
| RF-2023-4415 | Davis, Michelle | Davis, Paul | $9,800 | Auto | Approved | John M. | BTR Main | Nov 13 | |
| RF-2023-4412 | Brown, Stephanie | — | $6,500 | Personal | Funded | Sarah K. | BTR North | Nov 13 |
Branch status board — filter by status, officer, branch
Design Decisions
Five decisions.
Each one earned.
Internal tools live or die on efficiency. Every decision below was tested against one question: does this make an officer faster and less error-prone?
01
Progressive capture over one long form
Breaking the application into 6 logical steps — Borrower, Income, Co-Borrower, Assets, Vehicles, Summary — meant validation errors were caught at each stage, not discovered at submission. Officers knew exactly where they were and what came next.
02
Smart co-borrower toggle
The co-borrower section could be turned on or off with a single toggle. When on, the form mirrored the borrower's field structure exactly — officers didn't need to relearn the layout. The combined income summary updated automatically.
03
Auto-calculation transparency on the summary screen
Rather than just displaying an approved loan amount, the Summary screen showed how every number was derived — DTI ratio, LTV calculation, monthly payment breakdown. Officers could explain terms to borrowers without leaving the system.
04
Underwriter decision panel alongside the full application
Instead of a separate approval workflow, the underwriter's decision panel (Approve / Counter-Offer / Decline) lived alongside the full application packet in one view. No context switching, no printing — everything needed was on one screen.
05
Alert-first application queue
The dashboard surfaced today's pending applications at the top with status counts — Pending Review, Under Review, Approved, Declined. Branch managers saw the health of their queue without querying a report. Problems surfaced, not buried.
| App ID | Borrower | Amount | Type | Status | Officer | Date | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RF-2023-4421 | Martinez, Carlos | $8,500 | Personal | Pending Review | John M. | Nov 14 | |
| RF-2023-4420 | Johnson, Patricia | $12,200 | Auto | Approved | John M. | Nov 14 | |
| RF-2023-4418 | Williams, David | $5,000 | Personal | Funded | Sarah K. | Nov 13 | |
| RF-2023-4415 | Thompson, Angela | $15,000 | Personal | Under Review | John M. | Nov 13 | |
| RF-2023-4412 | Garcia, Robert | $3,200 | Personal | Declined | Sarah K. | Nov 12 | |
| RF-2023-4409 | Davis, Michelle | $9,800 | Auto | Approved | John M. | Nov 12 |
Outcome
Faster origination.
Fewer errors. Better handoff.
The redesigned LOS reduced per-application data entry steps and eliminated the most common causes of submission errors. Validated end-to-end with Figma Make before engineering investment — branch staff approved the flow in a single session.
900+
Branch locations
8
Screens redesigned
6
Form steps structured
Figma Make
Prototype method
Reflection
Internal tools are often the most under-designed products in a company — because the users can't leave. What makes them interesting is the constraint: these are power users doing the same task dozens of times a day. The smallest friction compounds. Figma Make let us find that friction before it was built in.
Some artifacts in this case study represent conceptual recreations of work completed during the engagement. Real customer data, personally identifiable information, and pre-release product details have been anonymized or replaced with representative placeholders to respect client confidentiality.