Backend Engineer
Since we launched over 3 years ago, we’ve been on a mission - A mission to make everyone (starting with our awesome Plumsters), financially better off!
We do this by helping automate their savings, avoid overpaying on bills, and providing a simple platform to invest, if they’d like to try and grow their money for the future.
Plum is a quirky and fun AI assistant that started life as a Messenger chatbot (now also available as an app for Android and iOS). By linking directly to our users’ bank accounts, we are able to analyse transaction data to learn about their income and spending.
We use this to make sure savings still happen even when they’re not thinking about it, because we believe this helps them save… MORE! We can also scan tariffs to advise when we think they’re paying too much on bills e.g. household utilities.
Plum is also a business, and every business ultimately needs to make money. But the social aspect of what we do is also really important to us. We’re trying to change things for the better, by helping our users fight against a confusing financial system that is stacked against the most vulnerable in society (such as those on low income or the elderly).
Specifically, here’s what we’re trying to tackle:
- 90% of UK savings accounts pay less than inflation
- £4bn lost to the loyalty penalty every year
- ⅔ of UK adults say money stress has affected the health or wellbeing of someone they know
Since the beginning of 2017, we've grown from 2 founders sharing a rusty desk in Soho, to a brilliant, hard-working team of 65+, and raised $19.3 million in total.
Now, with more than 1 million people already using Plum, we could use a little help with our mission… and that may be where you come in!
We’re looking for a talented Backend Engineer to join our Athens team.
Engineering at Plum
Our engineers come from a variety of backgrounds (physics, computer science, music, even history!) and we welcome all levels of experience. We value good engineering principles and healthy curiosity. We take a conservative approach to using external frameworks and we aspire to write simple, well-tested code, delivered in rapid iterations.
We currently operate a Python monolith on a 80+ pod Kubernetes cluster on Google Cloud Platform and wrangle ~1TB of data in Postgres and BigQuery. You'll get to work on bank data ingestion, payments, investments, data pipelines, user-facing features and our in-house chat framework (think NLP). On top, you'll play an integral role in taking Plum's infrastructure to an exciting next level – a suite of fault-tolerant, self-contained backend services. It's a really good chance to get your hands dirty with a product that is already used by 1m people in the UK.
How we work
We work in "squads" – a more startup-appropriate name for saying small, cross-functional teams. Each squad has a mission and a set of KPIs to monitor and improve. We have 3 of these squads right now – Savings, Investments and Black Ops. As an engineer you'll work in a squad but you can also reach out to and work with anyone in the company.
Our culture: openness and accountability
Even though you'll have a primary role, you can get involved in any aspect of the business you're interested in and contribute feedback and product ideas freely. In return, we'll expect you to back your decisions with data and logic. Features are considered finished when the data tells us that they've moved the needle.
What we look for
Technical knowledge is critical but we are a startup treading in uncharted territory so attitude is even more important. We're looking for people that like uncertainty and want to figure out how to do things that haven’t been done before. You're a true team player and inherently positive. Where others see problems, you see solutions.
Plum's Perks
- Join one of the hottest fintech start-ups in Athens Office
- We're all in this together! Own part of the company through stock options
- Flexibility to work from our London office (almost) whenever you want
- 22 days holiday a year, excluding public holidays (34 in total)
- Our annual team trip, to a secret destination
- An office brimming with fruit & snacks, coffee and plants
If you think this sounds like a bit of you then don’t hesitate to get in touch!
Contact: Georgia Charalambous - georgia
withplum [dot] com