Staff Software Engineer in Reading

Company Description Visa is a world leader in payments and technology, with over 259 billion payments transactions flowing safely between consumers, merchants, financial institutions, and government entities in more than 200 countries and territories each year. Our mission is to connect the world through the most innovative, convenient, reliable, and secure payments network, enabling individuals, businesses, and economies to thrive while driven by a common purpose – to uplift everyone, everywhere by being the best way to pay and be paid.

Job Description Working within the OVN Programme As the world’s largest retail electronic payments network Visa customers trust us with ensuring that they can pay with security and confidence everywhere they want to be. Network Processing looks after the systems that form the core of Visa, allowing consumers and merchants to connect with financial institutions and provide a seamless payment experience. The core mission of the OVN (Open VisaNet) team is to create the next generation of these core systems using the latest technologies to ensure we are able to maintain this trust going forward and ensure that Visa is ready for the challenges of the future.

We offer you the opportunity to be at the centre of innovation in the payments industry by joining us in the OVN team in Reading, where we are driving forward the implementation of the future of Visa. If you think you could support Visa as a Staff Software Engineer, we want to hear from you – together, let’s make Visa a great place to work. This is a hybrid position. Expectation of days in the office will be confirmed by your Hiring Manager.

Qualifications What we’re after… Building Open VisaNet will involve collaboration with an exceptional group of software engineers, security specialists, DevOps engineers, test automation engineers, designers, analysts, payment experts, and architects across multiple geographies. Joining this team means working in an agile cross-functional development environment, combining development, test/QA, and analysis/design skills.

The team is currently responsible for building key elements of the authorization application, which is a long-term delivery making use of a proprietary internal rules language alongside exposure to Go and Kafka in a Docker and Kubernetes micro-services environment when delivering services. Exposure to these technologies with a deep understanding of one or more and a desire to learn more is essential. More products will be added over time, which could bring more technologies into the remit of the team, so flexibility and a desire to learn is key.

As Go is an evolving language, candidates with a strong background in other languages (like C, C++ or Java) and a willingness to learn Go will be considered, with world-class training resources provided to support the transition. Working across the full spectrum of software development (including requirements gathering, design, development, QA, and deployment) and being comfortable working/leading on multiple workstreams is required.

Providing guidance to agile team members, acting as the design authority, and shaping best practices and ways of working within the team is a key aspect of this role. As a staff software engineer, leading specific project-level deliverables, maintaining stakeholder relationships with internal partners, and mentoring more junior members of the team will be expected. Understanding the blend between technical, leadership, and payment industry knowledge is crucial for any senior technical role in the OVN Team at Visa.

A willingness to learn and understand the highly complex intricacies of ISO Transaction Formats, business meanings, and specific fields alongside the complex interactions between them as business scenarios unfold is a sizable element of the role. The role also requires providing 24x7 3rd line support to our mission-critical system with an availability SLA of 99.9999%. This includes being available to work outside standard office hours, including evenings, weekends, and holidays, as necessary to ensure the continuous and reliable operation of the system.

This commitment to round-the-clock support is crucial for maintaining the high standards of service and reliability that our stakeholders and customers expect. Demonstrating a proactive approach to system monitoring and issue resolution, ensuring minimal disruption to services, is essential.

At Visa, we are embracing Generative AI (GenAI) technology across the entire software development lifecycle, with the vision of integrating GenAI into everything we do. This means that while working on core delivery within the OVN programme, you will also have opportunities to contribute to exciting, innovative GenAI projects. If you are a GenAI enthusiast, you will be able to explore and apply cutting‑edge AI capabilities in real‑world scenarios, alongside delivering high‑quality business outcomes.

In addition to development work, the successful candidate will also be expected to provide production system support, ensuring stability and reliability for our mission‑critical platforms. This role provides an ideal opportunity for someone with strong Software Engineering credentials who aims to increase their payment industry knowledge and experience.

What would a successful candidate need? Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, Electronics/ Electrical Engineering or a related technical discipline is required. Excellent communication skills, with examples of influencing, listening actively and negotiating within a team environment to effectively advocate for Software Engineering best practice within the department and communicate design decisions effectively. Extensive relevant work experience in electronic payment systems development desirable. Positive attitude, friendly to others, encouraging of co‑operation, honesty, and respectfulness in the workplace. Collaborative mindset, with an ability to empathise with colleagues and establish relationships. Willingness to develop extensive payments industry and authorisation specific business knowledge and understanding. Familiarity with agentic AI coding assistants (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Cline, Claude code) to accelerate development and improve code quality. Ability to integrate GenAI models into developer tools, CI/CD pipelines, or application logic using APIs or SDKs is a plus.