Lead Software Engineer – Payments

Lead Software Engineer – Payments We usually respond within three days ORDERYOYO Lead Software Engineer – Payments Remote · Quarterly team gatherings in one of our global offices · Competitive salary About the Role At OrderYOYO, payments sit at the heart of everything we do. Every order placed, every restaurant paid, and every dispute resolved runs through the systems this team owns and operates. We're looking for a Lead Software Engineer – Payments to own the next stage of our payments platform's evolution — as a hands-on technical leader who can grow and manage a team of payments engineers, set the technical direction for a business-critical domain, and support our transition to a more scalable operating model across online ordering and in-store platforms (POS, Kiosk, and payment terminals). You'll play a central role in shaping how OrderYOYO handles money — from authorisation and settlement to disputes and merchant invoicing — while building and developing the people who make that possible. Role Mission Lead the people, architecture, and delivery behind OrderYOYO's payments platform — enabling KYC onboarding, deductions, settlement/payout timing, dispute flows, and merchant invoicing — while growing a high-performing engineering team and raising the bar on reliability, security, and engineering quality in one of our most business-critical domains. Core Responsibilities People Leadership & Team Development • Lead, mentor, and grow a team of payments engineers — providing hands-on technical guidance, regular feedback, and clear paths for career development. • Own hiring and team-building for the payments engineering function, partnering with recruiting to define role profiles, run interviews, and bring in strong talent. • Run day-to-day people management: 1:1s, goal-setting, performance reviews, and career progression conversations for direct reports. • Build a team culture where payments knowledge is documented and shared, not tribal — through design reviews, standards, and mentoring. • Represent the payments engineering team in leadership and cross-functional conversations, translating business needs into technical strategy and team priorities. • Balance hands-on technical contribution with people-management responsibilities, staying close enough to the codebase to lead by example and unblock the team. Technical & Domain Ownership • Set the technical direction and long-term architecture strategy for payment-domain services, including gateway integrations, payment intent/authorisation/capture/refund flows, payout orchestration, and reconciliation. • Oversee marketplace capabilities: onboarding/KYC integration, merchant configuration, settlement instructions, deductions, and invoicing/merchant-statement alignment. • Ensure robust “flow-of-funds” primitives across the team's systems — idempotency, ledgers/events, and audit trails that are fully supportable for finance and compliance. • Own the strategy for PSP and partner integrations, with close attention to tri-party / sub-merchant implications where applicable. • Oversee dispute/chargeback and fraud-handling touchpoints across internal workflows and PSP tooling, and drive collaboration with Ops on runbooks and escalation paths. • Partner closely with Product, Legal/Compliance, Finance, and Support to convert requirements into safe, testable production behaviour. • Raise engineering quality in a high-change domain: automated testing, safe rollouts/canaries, observability, and incident-response improvements, with accountability for outcomes across the team. Must-Have Requirements • Proven experience leading, mentoring, or people-managing a team of software engineers — including hiring, performance management, and career development. • Strong backend engineering background in distributed systems — microservices, async processing, resilient APIs, and eventual consistency. • Production experience with payment flows (auth/capture/refund, webhooks, reconciliation) and “money correctness” patterns such as idempotency keys, double-entry thinking, and auditability. • A solid security mindset: PCI compliance, PII protection, secrets management, least privilege, and secure coding practices. • Comfort working in an Azure-first environment (APIs, queues/eventing, monitoring), with strong CI/CD and automated testing practices. • Clear, confident communication with both engineers and non-technical stakeholders in high-stakes scenarios — incidents, financial breaks, and compliance requests. • Strong judgement on when to move fast, when to standardise, and when to say “not yet” with evidence — balancing team capacity, technical debt, and business priorities. Strong-to-Have Experience • Experience scaling or restructuring an engineering team through periods of growth or organisational change. • Experience with sub-merchant, marketplace, or Payfac-like operating models (KYC, underwriting, settlements, fee deductions). • Familiarity with dispute tooling, card scheme rules, 3DS/risk rules, or fraud platforms. • Experience partnering with Legal, Compliance, or Finance leadership on regulatory or audit requirements. Who We Are At OrderYOYO, company culture comes first. We create a positive, inclusive environment where people are trusted to do their best work and take ownership of what they build. Personal development is central to how we work — engineers are encouraged to grow technically, take responsibility, and help shape how our products and platforms evolve. We help restaurants succeed online by providing branded websites, mobile apps, and tailored marketing solutions, giving them full control of their business. By removing high commission fees charged by third-party platforms, we empower restaurants to grow sustainably. Through our partnership with AppSmart, the market leader in POS and in-store systems, we've become the largest restaurant-focused platform in Europe. What We Offer • Competitive salary. • A remote role — work from wherever you do your best work, with quarterly in-person gatherings at one of our global offices. • High ownership and autonomy, with a direct hand in shaping the team you lead. • A clear leadership mandate, with scope to grow further into broader engineering management responsibilities. • The opportunity to lead work on revenue-critical production systems. • A strong focus on security, reliability, and engineering best practices. • A collaborative, international engineering team. • Real emphasis on learning, mentoring, and long-term growth — for you and for the people you lead. Department Research and Development Locations Cologne Remote status Fully Remote About OrderYOYO OrderYOYO provides online ordering solutions for independent restaurants and takeaways. We help partners build their own branded websites and apps, giving them the tools to grow customer relationships, manage online orders, and reduce reliance on third-party platforms. Our focus is on empowering local restaurants to thrive in the digital market.