Job Description
An Introduction to Primer
Primer is the world's first unified payment infrastructure, founded by former leaders of Braintree and PayPal. We unify fragmented payment and finance systems into a single, intelligent platform, automating the entire payments lifecycle from acceptance and orchestration to reconciliation, FX, and financial operations.
Trusted by leading merchants worldwide, we give finance, payments, and engineering teams the tools to move faster, reduce complexity, and unlock growth. Our open, modular platform connects to 150+ services across the payments ecosystem, while our expanding CFO product suite brings unified reconciliation, FX management, and financial visibility across markets and currencies.
Backed by Accel, Balderton, ICONIQ, and Tencent, we're setting a new standard for how the world moves money.
What will you be doing?
Setting and driving the technical strategy across the Partners engineering teams, from architecture decisions through to hands-on implementation
Owning the design of core backend services for high-performance distributed systems, with scale and reliability as non-negotiables
Acting as the technical authority on partner integrations — shaping how third-party PSPs connect with Primer's platform and raising the bar on what "seamless" actually means
Leading and influencing engineers across teams without direct authority — through code, design reviews, and technical mentorship
Spotting and resolving cross-team technical dependencies before they become blockers
Driving adoption of modern engineering practices (BDD, TDD, rigorous documentation) and holding the line on quality
Partnering closely with Product to shape roadmap decisions where the technical constraints or opportunities are material
What we're looking for
Demonstrable experience operating at staff or principal level — setting technical direction across multiple teams, not just within one
Deep backend engineering expertise, with a track record of designing and building distributed systems at scale
The kind of judgment that earns trust fast — engineers follow your technical lead because you're right, not because of your title
Experience with Python is a strong advantage; we're less concerned about specific languages than we are about depth of backend systems thinking
Solid understanding of payments infrastructure or developer platform engineering — you know what it takes to build for third-party integrators
Strong written and verbal communication; you can make complex technical decisions legible to non-technical stakeholders
You may not like it here if:
You prefer a defined lane — at Staff level here, you'll be expected to find and shape the work, not wait for it to be handed to you
You're not comfortable operating across multiple teams with competing priorities and no single source of authority
You want a QA team to catch your bugs — we don't have one, and we don't plan to
Remote-first feels like a compromise to you — for us it's a deliberate choice, and it requires discipline and strong async communication habits
✅ Our interview process
30 minute call with a Talent Partner
60 minute interview with an Engineering Manager
90 minute coding interview
90 minute system design interview
60 minute values-alignment interview
What’s the culture like at Primer?
We’ve been recognised as a top global employer, #1 in FinTech for ‘flexibility’!
We’re building a culture where people can come and do their best work and enjoy it. We want our people to be proud of the impact that they have at Primer, and of the work that they are doing. You will be working with a team of people who are mission-driven, smart, and reflective, and who are invested in building exceptional products and delivering success for our merchants (and we also know how to have fun along the way).
We work remotely. We believe that building a successful, profitable company goes beyond proximity. We invest in our relationships with each other through great remote working practices and thoughtfully designed face-to-face time together. Our heads-together time comes in the form of workstations, our annual company retreat, and co-working space access worldwide.
Finally, let’s go ahead and say it. The work that we do is challenging. Startups are a challenge, building category defining products is a challenge. You should be prepared for a challenge at Primer. But, there’s a big difference between a challenge and a struggle. The key difference is that the right challenge comes with the right support structures, an acceptance that not everything always goes to plan, a collaborative environment, and a great team around you. It’s never a challenge that you will face alone.
Our benefits
🌍 We are fully remote and globally distributed; and have been since day one
💰 Competitive share options
🌴 Uncapped holiday, with 25 days minimum to be taken
🗣️ Co-working space access
📅 Workations & Company Retreat
💻 The best equipment for your role
🏠 £500 towards your home office setup
🔎 Generous learning budget
🏥 Private Medical Insurance
📈 A broad set of additional perks and benefits (depending on location)
Don’t meet every single requirement?
At Primer, we’re dedicated to building a diverse, inclusive, and authentic workplace. If you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply. You may be the right candidate for this or other roles. Primer is committed to the equal treatment of all current and prospective employees, regardless of background or beliefs.
Primer adopts a zero-tolerance approach to discrimination. We are committed to providing equal opportunities to all current and prospective employees regardless of age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity, race or ethnicity, religion or belief, gender identity, or marriage and civil partnership.