Staff Software Engineer (Backend), Payments

Location(s): US (remote), Boston (hybrid), or New York (hybrid)

Toast is driven by building the restaurant platform that helps restaurants adapt, take control, and get back to what they do best: building the businesses they love.

We’re not your traditional tech company and we don’t aim to be. Going against the grain is in our DNA. Building a revolutionary product begins with revolutionary thinking. That’s why we value diversity of background and lived experience. Together, we empower restaurants of all sizes to build great teams, increase revenue, improve operations, and delight their guests. We pair our deep understanding of the restaurant industry with powerful cloud based software and restaurant-grade hardware to deliver an intuitive all-in-one platform. Join us on our mission to empower the restaurant community to delight guests, do what they love, and thrive.

Bready* to make a change?

Fintech at Toast operates one of the most critical portions of the Toast infrastructure: processing payments on behalf of our restaurants and ensuring that restaurants are paid in a timely manner. Payment processing is a key source of Toast’s revenue and also the lifeblood of our customers; we process millions of dollars in transactions per day.

We are seeking a Staff Software Engineer to join our Payments team to build out our unified payment processing solution. This platform offers a single, integrated service for payment acceptance across various channels and supports a configurable enterprise approach. It is designed to allow a build-once, available-to-all strategy for both existing and emerging payment methods. The successful candidate will guide and contribute to the development of services providing supporting and core functionality within and around this payment processing solution.

About this roll* (Responsibilities)

• Plan, design, build, and deliver features for Toast’s payments products

• Plan, develop, and implement best practices such as automated test suites to ensure the code shipped to our customers meets the highest quality standards

• Roll - pun intended! - features out to customers, including monitoring for success

• Collaborate with our PM (and UX) on the definition and design of features

• Collaborate and partner with a wide array of teams across Toast in order to spread knowledge inter- and intra-team

• Lead and work with experienced engineers to deliver design and code review

Do you have the right ingredients*? (Requirements)

• 8+ years of experience in designing and implementing robust backend services

• Ability to step into a technical leadership role on the team, guiding/coaching/mentor more junior engineers on best practices in architecture, design, coding, testing, deployment, etc.

• Proven ability to design and develop scalable and secure APIs that integrate with various internal/external systems

• Applied knowledge of best practices in API lifecycle management, including versioning, documentation, and deprecation strategies, with the ability to share this amongst the team and peers

• Demonstrated experience with microservices architecture and containerization technologies for enhanced scalability and maintainability

Special Sauce (*Nice to Haves)

• Demonstrated proficiency with DynamoDB or PostgreSQL

• Proficiency in Kotlin (or Java and willing to learn Kotlin) and Kotlin-specific frameworks and libraries for building efficient backend solutions

• Experience with modern data architectures (event sourcing, OLAP, ETL/ELT, streaming data)

• Experience designing payments APIs

• Familiarity with PCI-DSS

• Familiarity with AI-augmented development workflows and tools (e.g., Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, Codex, or similar)

AI at Toast

At Toast, one of our company values is that we're hungry to build and learn. We believe learning new AI tools empowers us to build for our customers faster, more independently, and with higher quality. We provide these tools across all disciplines, from Engineering and Product to Sales and Support, and are inspired by how our Toasters are already driving real value with them. The people who thrive here are those who embrace changes that let us build more for our customers; it’s a core part of our culture.

Our Total Rewards Philosophy
We strive to provide competitive compensation and benefits programs that help to attract, retain, and motivate the best and brightest people in our industry. Our total rewards package goes beyond great earnings potential and provides the means to a healthy lifestyle with the flexibility to meet Toasters’ changing needs. Learn more about our benefits at https://careers.toasttab.com/toast-benefits.

The base salary range for this role is listed below. The starting salary will be determined based on skills and experience. In addition to base salary, our total rewards components include cash compensation (overtime, bonus/commissions, if eligible), benefits, and equity (if eligible).

Pay Range
$168,000—$269,000 USD

How Toast Uses AI in its Hiring Process

Throughout the hiring process, our goal is to get to know you. We use AI tools to support our recruiters and interviewers with tasks like note-taking, summarization, and documentation of interviews to ensure they can be fully focused on your conversation. All hiring decisions are made by people.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion is Baked into our Recipe for Success

At Toast, our employees are our secret ingredient—when they thrive, we thrive. The restaurant industry is one of the most diverse, and we embrace that diversity with authenticity, inclusivity, respect, and humility. By embedding these principles into our culture and design, we create equitable opportunities for all and raise the bar in delivering exceptional experiences.

We Thrive Together

We embrace a hybrid work model that fosters in-person collaboration while valuing individual needs. Our goal is to build a strong culture of connection as we work together to empower the restaurant community. To learn more about how we work globally and regionally, check out: https://careers.toasttab.com/locations-toast.

Apply today!

Toast is committed to creating an accessible and inclusive hiring process. As part of this commitment, we strive to provide reasonable accommodations for persons with disabilities to enable them to access the hiring process. If you need an accommodation to access the job application or interview process, please contact [email protected].

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For roles in the United States, it is unlawful in Massachusetts to require or administer a lie detector test as a condition of employment or continued employment. An employer who violates this law shall be subject to criminal penalties and civil liability.