Software Quality Assurance Tester

Purpose of this Role

This is a remote, long-term contract role for a Quality Assurance Tester with redPanda Development Services in the UK.

You’ll work with the Delivery Owner, Solutions Owner, Developers, and Designers to make sure every feature we deliver meets the right standard — technically and for the user. Majority of your testing will be functional testing.

You’ll work in a custom software development environment, which is very different from the product world.

In custom delivery, change is constant, priorities shift, and each client has unique goals and constraints.

At redPanda, quality isn’t something we check at the end. It’s how we think, plan, and deliver from the start.

This role reports into the Delivery Owner.

How You Will Work

• As a QA Tester, you connect ideas to users.
• You take time to understand how the business works, how people use the product, and what problems we’re solving.
• You test with purpose — not just to find bugs, but to make sure what we deliver works well, fits the system, and makes sense to the user.
• You ask questions when something isn’t clear, raise risks early, and help the team make better decisions before code is released.
• You work closely with the Delivery Owner, Solutions Owner, Developers, and Designers to keep quality visible across the whole process — for both the team and the client.
• You plan your time carefully around sprints, releases, and production testing.
• You take ownership of your work, and you always look for ways to improve how we deliver quality.

Core Responsibilities

Requirements & Planning

• Read and understand each story or requirement before testing begins — you can’t test what you don’t understand.
• Ask questions early if requirements or acceptance criteria are unclear or incomplete.
• Think about how each change fits into the wider system and what other areas might be affected.
• Identify risks or gaps and raise them with the Delivery Owner, Solutions Owner, Developers, or Designers before development is complete.
• Plan your testing time around sprint work, upcoming releases, potential production issue testing, and team priorities.
• Organise your work so the most important testing happens first.
• Learn enough about the business and product to see things from the user’s point of view.

Testing Execution

• Write and execute test cases that check functionality, usability, and performance.
• Include regression, exploratory, and negative testing as part of your process.
• Test across different tech stacks — projects and tools will vary.
• Confirm that each story meets its requirements, acceptance criteria, and user expectations.
• Record bugs clearly, using simple, factual language that makes them easy to understand.
• Work with the Delivery Owner, Solutions Owner, Developers, and Designers to resolve issues quickly and accurately.
• Retest fixes to confirm issues are properly resolved and no new ones were introduced.
• Focus your time and testing effort on what matters most for release readiness.

Release & Quality Management

• Keep track of planned releases and plan your testing schedule around them.
• Carry out UAT and post-release testing to confirm production stability.
• Provide clear sign-off when you’re confident a feature is ready for release.
• Watch project bug trends — if defect rates rise, raise it early and suggest ways to reduce them.
• Support the team when production issues occur and help confirm fixes quickly.
• Keep release notes and handover information up to date so both the team and client have clear visibility of what’s been delivered.

Continuous Improvement & Documentation

• Document repeatable test cases and create simple “how-to” guides where they help others.
• Keep your documentation clear and easy for anyone on the team or client side to follow.
• Look for ways to improve how we test — small changes that make the process faster, clearer, or more reliable.
• Share what you learn so the whole team benefits.
• Review your own testing approach regularly and keep finding better ways to work.

Expectations in Practice

• You take time to understand what you’re testing before you start — because you can’t test what you don’t understand.
• You think about the user and the business, not just the code.
• You raise questions and risks early instead of waiting for others to notice.
• You write and report bugs in a way that anyone can understand, even without technical detail.
• You plan your time around priorities, sprints, and releases without needing constant direction.
• You care about the number and type of bugs on your project and help reduce them over time.
• You stay organised, keep the team informed, and make your work visible.
• You adapt easily when things change — tech, timelines, or priorities.
• You communicate clearly and directly with everyone — Delivery Owner, Solutions Owner, Developers, Designers, and the client.
• You take pride in consistent, careful work and always look for small ways to make the process better.
• You use AI to speed up testing and documentation. Make them faster and easier and you still know exactly what's happening on your project

Skills & Experience

Essential

• Minimum 1 year as a QA in an agile development environment.
• Hands-on experience testing web-based systems.
• Ability to communicate in a clear, direct, and simple way — no jargon, no ambiguity — so everyone on the team and the client side understands you.
• Experience using Jira and Confluence.
• Understanding of agile delivery methods like Scrum or Kanban.

Desirable

• 5+ years’ experience in QA for senior roles.
• Experience setting up both functional and API testing automation.
• Experience testing enterprise or large-scale web systems.

Who You Are

• You’re curious — you want to understand how things work before you test them.
• You believe you can’t test what you don’t understand.
• You see the bigger picture and understand how each change affects the rest of the system.
• You communicate clearly and simply, so your message is easy for anyone — team or client — to understand.
• You ask questions early and speak up when something doesn’t make sense.
• You plan your work, manage your time well, and keep yourself organised.
• You adapt easily when projects, teams, or technologies change.
• You take ownership of your work — you care about the result, not just the task.
• You stay consistent and take pride in doing things properly.
• You look for small, continuous ways to improve your testing and the team’s process.

Who We Are

Built on experience. Driven by improvement.

• We’re a remote-first company that believes good work happens when people have clarity, accountability, and space to focus.
• We work in custom software — meaning no two projects are ever the same — and that keeps things challenging and interesting.
• We value open communication, teamwork, and practical problem-solving.
• We take ownership, think critically, and care about the craft of doing great work.

What You’ll Need

• A reliable computer, headset and camera.
• Stable internet connection (all meetings and work are online).
• Backup plan if you have internet or power issues.
• You can work from anywhere, as long as it’s quiet, professional, and free from background noise or distractions during calls.
• You can easily adapt to work remotely with distributed and asynchronous teams.

What to Expect: Our Interview Process

We want to give you a clear picture of what our interview process looks like, so you know what to expect at every stage. The process has four steps. Every stage is recorded, and we work from the transcript of that recording to carry out our analysis. At each stage we look at whether your skills, experience, way of thinking and communication all line up and are a good fit for our company. This analysis is there to support our decision making. A person makes the final decision at every step. Each stage builds on what we learned in the one before it.

Step 1: Initial Video Interview

You will record answers to a set of interview questions on video. This gives us a first look at your experience and how you communicate. We review every recording and use it to decide who moves forward to the next step.

To complete Step 1: Initial Video Interview, please go to this link https://app.hireflix.com/public-application/6a7ee9bde26008ae3dfca6b0 and answer the questions.

Step 2: Assessment

Shortlisted candidates complete a practical assessment relevant to the role. This is your chance to show us how you think and work in practice, not just how you describe it.

Step 3: First Interview

Shortlisted candidates meet with our Managing Director and Head of Operations. This interview is recorded and reviewed alongside everything we have learned about you so far.

Step 4: Second Interview

Candidates who reach this stage meet again with our Managing Director and Head of Operations, joined this time by the Delivery Owner team. This is our final chance to get to know you and for you to get to know us.

Final Decision

After the second interview, we bring together everything we have learned across all four steps to make our final decision. We will let you know the outcome and, if successful, talk you through next steps and the offer.

Please consider your application unsuccessful if you have not heard back from us in three weeks.