Senior Quality Engineer - Underwriting

Bestow; Northern (KY); Hybrid; USD 140,000 - 180,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Competitive salary & equity

Flexible remote/hybrid work

Medical, dental, vision insurance

Lifestyle stipend

Parental leave

Dallas Deep Ellum office availability

Diversity & inclusion programs

Job summary

Bestow is hiring a senior Quality Engineer to own underwriting test strategy and evidence workflows. You will partner with underwriters, actuaries, product, and engineering to ensure rule changes and data outputs are correct before release.

The role emphasizes domain judgment, with opportunities to grow automation skills and influence across the underwriting domain. Remote/hybrid work is available with a Dallas office option.

Qualifications

• 7+ years in life insurance, with substantial time in or directly adjacent to underwriting.
• Fluency with underwriting evidence and processes (MIB, APS handling, table ratings, NIGO workflows, etc.).
• Hands-on experience configuring or testing an underwriting rules engine or decisioning platform (e.g. AURA, Magnum, FAST).
• SQL skills strong enough to independently verify data outcomes.
• Experience writing structured test cases or acceptance criteria and defending quality judgments.
• Nice to have: test automation in code (JS/TS, Playwright, pytest), API testing tools, CI/CD familiarity, annuities exposure.

Responsibilities

• Own test strategy and quality signals for underwriting decisions, including rules changes and evidence ingestion.
• Design test scenarios reflecting underwriting complexity and edge cases.
• Validate rules engine behavior across releases with regression checks.
• Translate underwriting requirements into testable criteria with underwriters and product.
• Build and extend API-level and data-level automated checks with QE team.
• Investigate production underwriting discrepancies from root cause to prevention.
• Serve as QE go-to authority on underwriting correctness.

Skills

Underwriting expertise

SQL

Test case development

Test automation (JS/TS, Playwright, Py

Rules engine testing

Tools

AURA

Magnum

FAST

Job description

ABOUT BESTOW

Life insurance is one of the world's most important products. It's also one of the hardest to build, distribute, and modernize. Bestow exists to change that.

Bestow is a leading vertical technology platform serving some of the largest and most innovative life insurers. Our platform unifies the fragmented, legacy value chain, enabling carriers to launch products in weeks instead of years. Carriers choose us to scale and operate at unprecedented speed, powered by AI and automation.

Bestow isn't selling policies. We're building the infrastructure that helps an entire industry move faster, reach more people, and deliver on its promise.

Backed by leading investors (Goldman Sachs, Hedosophia, NEA, Valar, 8VC) and trusted by major carriers, Bestow is powered by a team that moves with precision, purpose, and heart. If you want to help reimagine a centuries-old industry with lasting impact, join us.

Bestow offers flexible remote/hybrid work, meaningful benefits, equity, and substantial growth opportunities.

Bestow uses E-Verify to confirm the employment eligibility of all newly hired employees. To learn more about E-Verify, including your rights and responsibilities, please visit E-Verify.gov.

ABOUT THE TEAM

The Quality Engineering (QE) team makes sure the decisions Bestow's platform produces for carrier partners are correct, not just technically functional. This role is our reference authority on underwriting correctness. You'll partner with underwriters, actuaries, product, and engineering to make sure every rule change, evidence integration, and risk classification holds up before it reaches a carrier.

We're hiring a senior individual contributor whose main qualification is deep life insurance underwriting expertise. You've spent years working in or testing underwriting operations and systems, and you can look at a decision output and know whether it's right before anyone writes a defect report. Domain depth is the requirement. Test automation skill is highly valued, but we can train it. If you're an expert automation engineer with light insurance exposure, this probably isn't the right fit. If you're an underwriting systems expert, underwriting business analyst, or QA specialist who has lived inside rules engines and evidence workflows and wants to grow your engineering skills, then you are on the right path.

Reports to the Quality Engineering Director.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

• Own test strategy and quality signal for underwriting decisioning, including rules changes, evidence ingestion, risk classification, and case outcomes.

• Design test scenarios that reflect real underwriting complexity: combinations of impairments, evidence sources, table ratings, and edge cases that generic test coverage misses.

• Validate rules engine behavior across releases, running regression on decision outcomes and not just API contracts.

• Translate underwriting requirements into testable acceptance criteria with underwriters, actuaries, and product before code is written.

• Build and extend API-level and data-level automated checks with the core QE team, growing toward full ownership of automation for the underwriting domain.

• Investigate production underwriting discrepancies and take them from root cause analysis through defect prevention.

• Serve as the QE organization's go-to authority on underwriting correctness.

WHO YOU ARE

• 7+ years in life insurance, with substantial time in or directly adjacent to underwriting: underwriting operations, underwriting systems analysis, new business, or testing underwriting platforms.

• Working fluency with underwriting evidence and process, including application Part 1 and Part 2, Medical Information Bureau (MIB), prescription (Rx) and motor vehicle record (MVR) data, attending physician statement (APS) handling, table ratings, not in good order (NIGO) workflows, and accelerated or automated underwriting programs.

• Hands-on experience configuring, analyzing, or testing at least one underwriting rules engine or decisioning platform (for example AURA, Magnum, FAST, or a carrier-built engine).

• SQL skills strong enough to independently verify data outcomes.

• Experience writing structured test cases or acceptance criteria and defending quality judgments to engineering and business stakeholders.

• Nice to have (we'll help you grow here): test automation in code (JavaScript/TypeScript, Playwright, pytest, or similar), API testing tools and CI/CD familiarity, and annuities exposure such as suitability review, 1035 exchanges, and income rider mechanics.

WHAT TO EXPECT

A few honest notes so nobody is surprised in month two. This is a senior IC role, not a pure automation role and not a management role. Your leverage comes from domain judgment first and tooling second. Some of the systems you'll test integrate with legacy carrier and vendor platforms, so the work includes ambiguity, incomplete documentation, and some archaeology. You'll also be the deepest underwriting expert on the QE team, which means real influence and sometimes being the only person in the room who can answer the question.

TOTAL REWARDS

At Bestow, we’re proud to be awarded for our team members, innovative products, and culture. Our standard benefits for full-time employees include:

• Competitive salary and equity based on role

• Policies and managers that support work/life balance, like our flexible paid time off and parental leave programs

• 100% paid-premium option for medical, dental, and vision insurance

• Lifestyle stipend to support your physical, emotional, and financial wellbeing

• Flexible work-from-home policy and open to remote

• Remote and WFH options, as well as a beautiful, state-of-the-art office in Dallas' Deep Ellum, for those who prefer an office setting

• Employee-led diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives

Recent Employer Awards include:

• Best Place for Working Parents 2023 + 2024 + 2025

• Great Place to Work Certified, 2022 + 2023 + 2024 + 2025

• Built In Best Places to Work, 2022 + 2023 + 2025

• Fortune's Best Workplaces in Texas 2022 + 2023

• Fortune's Best Workplaces in Financial Services and Insurance 2022 + 2023 + 2024

We value diversity at Bestow. The company will hire, recruit, and promote regardless of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, pregnancy or maternity, veteran status, or any other status protected by applicable law. We understand the importance of creating a safe and comfortable work environment and encourage individualism and authenticity in every team member.

Thanks for considering a job at Bestow!