software engineer

Senior Software Engineer

Engagement: Full‑Time Contractor
Location: London / Hybrid
Length: 12 month contract

We are seeking a software engineer specialising in distributed data systems to design and build low‑latency, high‑volume data processing solutions that underpin regulatory voice compliance assurance across the Bank's strategic data platforms.

This is a hands‑on software development role, focused on event‑driven architectures, streaming pipelines, and scalable data matching engines rather than traditional reporting or BI. You will engineer resilient, production‑grade systems capable of processing high‑frequency voice metadata and transactional records at scale, ensuring accuracy, determinism and auditability in compliance controls.

You will join a team responsible for delivering mission‑critical compliance technology across enterprise voice platforms, operating in a highly regulated environment where correctness, performance and reliability are non‑negotiable. [1]

• Distributed streaming and batch data processing systems for voice compliance assurance
• Low‑latency record matching and reconciliation engines handling billions of events
• Scalable data services operating across Spark, Kafka, Hive and Hadoop
• Production‑grade pipelines supporting regulatory evidence, audit and controls
• Foundations for near‑real‑time compliance signal generation across global voice platforms [2]

• Design and develop high‑performance distributed systems for large‑scale voice data processing
• Build and optimise Spark‑based processing jobs for high‑volume and high‑frequency workloads
• Engineer Kafka‑based streaming pipelines with strong delivery guarantees and low end‑to‑end latency
• Develop robust data matching and reconciliation logic across heterogeneous voice data sources
• Define and implement scalable data models using Hive and Hadoop ecosystems
• Apply software engineering best practices: version control, code reviews, testing, CI/CD and documentation
• Reverse‑engineer and modernise legacy batch or reporting‑oriented implementations
• Implement data quality, integrity, lineage and auditability controls required for regulatory assurance
• Partner with platform, vendor and voice engineering teams to align data semantics and system behaviour
• Support synthetic data generation and large‑scale performance testing
• Deliver changes through controlled environments in line with enterprise change and release processes [3]

Core Technologies

• Strong hands‑on development experience with Apache Spark
• Proven experience building Kafka‑based event streaming systems
• Deep familiarity with Hadoop ecosystems, including Hive
• Advanced SQL for complex, large‑scale datasets

Engineering Capabilities

• Experience designing low‑latency, high‑throughput data pipelines
• Strong understanding of distributed systems, data partitioning, fault tolerance and scalability
• Ability to distinguish and design appropriately for high‑frequency transactional vs high‑volume batch workloads
• Experience building ETL / ELT systems as production software, not ad‑hoc scripts
• Comfortable working close to infrastructure and platform constraints

Nice to Have

• Exposure to voice or communications platforms (e.g. Cisco, NICE, IPC, Microsoft)
• Experience working in regulated or compliance‑driven environments
• Familiarity with Agile delivery models and iterative software development

TO APPLY - PLEASE APPLY WITH AN UP-TO-DATE CV

Candidates will ideally show evidence of the above in their CV in order to be considered.

Please be advised if you haven't heard from us within 48 hours then unfortunately your application has not been successful on this occasion, we may however keep your details on file for any suitable future vacancies and contact you accordingly.

*Pontoon is an employment consultancy. We put expertise, energy, and enthusiasm into improving everyone's chance of being part of the workplace. We respect and appreciate people of all ethnicities, generations, religious beliefs, sexual orientations, gender identities, and more. We do this by showcasing their talents, skills, and unique experience in an inclusive environment that helps them thrive.

We use generative AI tools to support our candidate screening process. This helps us ensure a fair, consistent, and efficient experience for all applicants. Rest assured, all final decisions are made by our hiring team, and your application will be reviewed with care and attention.