Staff Data Engineer

RVU Limited; London Borough of Southwark; Hybrid; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

10% discretionary bonus

Hybrid working: 2 days in office

Employer-matching pension up to 7.5%

Work-from-home budget £300

Job summary

Tempcover in London is seeking a Staff Data Engineer to join the Data & Analytics team. You will lead the development of a cloud-based data platform on Google Cloud Platform, delivering ELT pipelines, data models, and quality controls to empower data-driven decisions across the business.

The role involves collaboration with data analysts and business stakeholders to translate requirements into scalable solutions. A hybrid setup offers 2 in-office days per week with potential Fleet office options.

Qualifications

• Advanced SQL with complex queries, partitioning and cost-aware optimisation.
• Experience with modern orchestration/ELT tools like Dagster and dbt.
• Strong Python for data engineering tasks.
• Solid data warehousing knowledge and dimensional modelling.

Responsibilities

• Design, build and maintain ELT pipelines on BigQuery using dbt and Dagster+, with reliability and idempotency.
• Create and manage scalable data models for analytics.
• Propose and implement platform improvements.
• Lead performance monitoring and tuning.
• Implement data contracts, observability, and lineage.

Skills

Advanced SQL

Dagster/dbt

Python

Data warehousing

AI/LLM data models

Cloud data infra (GCP)

CI/CD

Git/DevOps

Tools

Dagster

dbt

BigQuery

Job description

Staff Data Engineer

Department: Data & Analytics

Employment Type: Full Time

Location: London

Description

Hybrid: 2 days per week in our Tower Bridge office. Role can also be based in Fleet office. Tempcover

Tempcover is at the forefront of the fast-growing world of short-term insurance. Our mission is to make car insurance flexible, quick, and easy for drivers. We’ve sold millions of policies that have helped drivers get where they need to go, but we’re not finished there. We’re growing our team to help us continue in that mission. If you are extraordinary at what you do and want to be a part of a rapidly growing business at the cutting edge of the InsureTech industry, we would love to hear from you

The team The Data and Analytics team within Tempcover provide a vital role in bringing data, MI and Insight to life for internal & external stakeholders and partners.

The Staff Data Engineer will be responsible in partnership with the Data Engineering team for the development of the Tempcover cloud based data platform, supporting the wider business in making data-driven decisions. Drive the development and optimisation of data pipelines, data models and data quality controls. This role will require collaboration with data analysts and business stakeholders to translate data needs into scalable and reliable solutions.

Tempcover has chosen Google BigQuery, Dagster+ and dbt as the foundation of its new data platform, and you'll help build it. We're delivering the first "pizza slice" now: a thin, end-to-end piece of the platform that proves the architecture and gives stakeholders value early. You’ll spend most of your time building new capability on our GCP platform. You’ll also help support and maintain the existing Azure platform, keeping it dependable and helping us decommission it over the next twelve months.

This is a deliberate redesign, not a lift-and-shift. The platform has grown over five years through new data models, integrations and technologies. We're now using that experience to define what "great" looks like. Several significant upcoming projects will create more data for our analysts to use in marketing, pricing, product and commercial decisions. In particular, we want an AI first data platform that analysts and stakeholders can use directly.

What you'll be doing

As a Staff Data Engineer, you will:

• Raise the technical bar. Work with our Staff and Lead Data Engineers to set the architecture and engineering standards for the new platform, and bring a fresh view of what "great" looks like.
• Deliver in slices. Deliver high-value features on BigQuery quickly to win stakeholder buy-in, on foundations that can support future AI and advanced analytics.
• Keep Azure running. Help support the existing platform and keep it dependable while we move away from it over the next 12 months.
• Challenge and influence. Question the status quo, steer technical direction, and help the wider team do the same.
• Own the outcome. Stay with the platform from the first slice to a fully scaled ecosystem that grows with Tempcover's ambition to be the outright leader in the temp market.

Key Duties & Responsibilities:

• Design, build and maintain ELT pipelines on BigQuery using dbt and Dagster+, with reliability, testing and idempotency built in from the start
• Create and manage accurate and performant data models to support Tempcover’s analytical capability.
• Propose and implement internal improvement initiatives to the data platform.
• Lead proactive approach to performance monitoring/tuning.
• Implement data contracts, observability and lineage so that data quality issues are caught early and downstream consumers can trust and trace what they use.
• Define and champion engineering standards, including CI/CD, infrastructure-as-code and testing practices, across the data platform.
• Provide continued support to ensure high availability of data to the wider business
• Work closely with analysts across MI, Marketing, Product, Underwriting and Pricing to understand data requirements and translate them into effective solutions.
• Work with rigour to ensure data quality/accuracy.
• Mentor and guide junior data engineers, providing technical expertise and project oversight.

What we're looking for

• Advanced SQL, including writing complex queries, partitioning, clustering and cost-aware query optimisation .
• Experience of modern orchestration/ELT tooling, ideally Dagster and dbt.
• Strong Python for data engineering
• Solid understanding of data warehousing techniques; ETL/ELT processes and dimensional modelling.
• Experience designing data models and documentation that are usable by AI/LLM-based analytics tools (semantic layers, metadata, access controls).
• In-depth knowledge of cloud data infrastructure, ideally GCP (Azure or AWS also considered).
• Excellent problem-solving skills and the ability to work independently and collaboratively in a fast-paced environment.
• Hands-on experience building CI/CD pipelines to test and deploy data code reliably across environments.
• Proficiency with Git/DevOps for version control and collaboration.

Beneficial

• API integration.
• Ability to work within an agile development environment working directly with analysts and business stakeholders to shape requirements, agree priorities and deliver incremental value.
• Experience controlling BigQuery cost and performance, for example through slot management, partitioning strategy and usage monitoring.
• Experience of Azure orchestration/ELT tooling
• Understanding of visualisation and dashboard products (e.g. Power BI, Tableau, Qlik)

You don’t need to tick off everything on this list - so don’t let that hold you back from applying. We want to make sure you’re learning plenty during your time with us!

Our commitment to you

We are dedicated to developing valuable, inclusive, and user-friendly products and services that deliver positive outcomes for all of our customers. To achieve this, it’s essential that our teams reflect the diverse range of people in our community. We believe in being the change we wish to see in the world, by embracing our differences and holding ourselves accountable to being open and inclusive teammates and wider community members.

What we offer

We want to give you a great work environment, support your growth both personally and professionally, and provide benefits that make your time at RVU even more enjoyable. Here are some of the benefits you can look forward to:

• 10% discretionary yearly bonus and yearly pay reviews (based on RVU and personal performance)
• A hybrid working approach with 2 in-office days per week and up to 22 working days per year to “work from anywhere”
• Employer-matching pension contributions up to 7.5%
• A one-off £300 “work from home” budget to help contribute towards