Senior Backend Engineer - Global VAT & Payments

Whatnot; United States; Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

Whatnot, the largest live shopping platform in North America and Europe, seeks a Senior Backend Engineer for its International Engineering team to scale global systems after transactions.

You will work on cross-border infrastructure, VAT tooling, tax compliance, and international post-purchase experiences, building durable backend services in Python or Go that support millions of transactions across multiple countries.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional software engineering experience.
• Strong backend engineering experience in distributed systems or large-scale platforms.
• Experience designing, operating, and scaling reliable production services.
• Strong proficiency in Python or Go.
• Experience with relational databases and event-driven architectures.
• Ability to drive projects independently from ambiguous problem statements to production launch.
• Excellent communication skills across engineering, product, operations, and business stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Design and build highly scalable backend systems for international scale and multiple regulatory environments.
• Develop cross-border transaction infrastructure, VAT tooling, and tax-related capabilities.
• Implement international post-purchase experiences and marketplace operational tooling and automation.
• Collaborate with internal teams (payments, logistics, platform) to build durable long-term infrastructure.
• Support growth by delivering reliable services and responding to evolving regulatory requirements.

Skills

Distributed systems

Backend engineering

Python or Go

Relational databases

Event-driven architecture

Independent delivery

Cross-team communication

Job description

Whatnot, the largest live shopping platform in North America and Europe, seeks a Senior Backend Engineer for its International Engineering team to scale global systems after transactions.

You will work on cross-border infrastructure, VAT tooling, tax compliance, and international post-purchase experiences, building durable backend services in Python or Go that support millions of transactions across multiple countries.