Principal Software Engineer Payments, Fraud & Risk
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Job Location:
Monthly Salary:
Posted on:
Yesterday
Vacancies:
1 Vacancy
Job Summary
About Toast
Toast is the leading restaurant platform powering payments financial services and operational tools for restaurants globally. Our systems process billions of dollars annually and our Fraud & Risk platforms are critical to protecting merchants guests and Toast itself.
At Toast Principal Engineers (P5) are senior technical leaders who define direction unblock teams and deliver scalable outcomes across the organization.
Are you bready to design systems that protect revenue stop fraud in real time and scale globally
Role
As a Principal Software Engineer (P5) on the Fraud & Risk platform you will be responsible for end-to-end technical ownership of highly complex business-critical systems.
You Will:
Define architecture and long-term technical strategy
Drive execution across multiple teams
Make high-stakes technical decisions with broad business impact
Act as a multiplier for engineering quality and velocity
You will operate comfortably in ambiguity and help Toast scale safely as transaction volumes fraud sophistication and regulatory complexity grow.
What Youll Do
1. Technical Direction & Architecture (Primary Accountability)
Own and evolve the architecture for Fraud and Risk systems spanning multiple teams
Define long-term technical vision and roadmaps aligned with Toasts business goals
Lead and approve architecture and design reviews for high-impact initiatives
Make trade-off decisions across latency accuracy cost scalability and reliability
2. Fraud & Risk Systems at Scale
Design and operate systems for:
Real-time fraud detection and prevention
Risk scoring and decisioning engines
Chargeback prevention and dispute workflows
Build low-latency high-throughput distributed systems processing millions of transactions per day
Partner with the Data Science team to productionize fraud and risk models with strict SLAs
3. Execution Through Influence (Not Ownership Alone)
Drive complex initiatives that require coordination across multiple engineering teams
Influence technical decisions without direct authority
Identify systemic issues and proactively drive cross-org solutions
4. Reliability Scale & Operational Excellence
Ensure systems meet availability durability and compliance requirements (PCI SOC etc.)
Design for failure modes graceful degradation and recovery
Improve observability incident response and operational maturity
Optimize infrastructure and architecture for cost at scale
5. Mentorship & Raising the Engineering Bar
Mentor Senior and Staff engineers helping them grow technical leadership skills
Set standards for code quality design rigor testing and operational readiness
Lead by example with hands-on contributions where impact is highest
What Were Looking For
Experience & Scope
12 years of software engineering experience with demonstrated P5-level or equivalent impact
Proven ownership of large mission-critical systems with significant business impact
History of driving results in ambiguous fast-moving environments
Fraud Risk & Payments Expertise
Deep experience in payments fraud detection risk systems or financial platforms
Strong understanding of real-time decisioning systems
Experience working with fraud signals rules engines or ML-driven risk models is highly valued
Technical Depth
Expertise in Java or Kotlin (backend focus)
Strong fundamentals in distributed systems microservices and event-driven architectures
Deep experience with AWS and cloud-native design
Strong knowledge of data stores (Postgres DynamoDB etc.) and messaging systems
Leadership & Judgment
Exceptional problem-solving and decision-making skills
Strong written and verbal communication skills; able to clearly articulate complex trade-offs
Comfortable being accountable for decisions with a large blast radius
Our Spread of Total Rewards
Toast offers a competitive compensation and benefits package that supports a healthy lifestyle and flexibility for our employees needs. Learn more about our benefits: Toast Benefits.
Our Tech Stack
Toasts stack includes:
Backend: Microservices architecture in Java and Dropwizard AWS services (S3 RDS Lambda) .NET/C# and Java
Frontend: React ES6 MVC and Angular
Data: Postgres databases RabbitMQ clusters Apache Spark SQS SNS DynamoDB Redshift OpenSearch and Druid
We Are Toasters
Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) are baked into our recipe for success. Toast embraces the diversity of the restaurant industry fostering inclusivity respect and trust. We believe equitable opportunities and authentic principles drive success enabling us to lead in our industry.
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 ingredientwhen they thrive we 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: 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 .
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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.
Required Experience:
Staff IC
Key Skills
- Continuous Integration
- Docker
- Jenkins
- Python
- System Design
- Agile
- C/C++
- Go
- Systems Engineering
- Software Development
- Java
- Distributed Systems
About Company
Toast is a restaurant point of sale and management system that helps restaurants improve operations, increase sales and create a better guest experience.
