Senior Software Engineer in Test

Contract | Inside IR35 | £400 per day
Location: Manchester (Hybrid - 2-3 days onsite per week)
Contract End Date: March 2027

I'm currently working with a large, well‑established enterprise client who are continuing to grow their digital engineering capability in Manchester. They are looking to engage an experienced Senior Software Engineer in Test on a long‑term contract to support the delivery of high‑quality, scalable, cloud‑based digital platforms.

This is an excellent opportunity for a senior‑level test professional to join a collaborative, agile environment where quality, automation, and engineering best practice are taken seriously. The role offers strong delivery stability with a contract running until March 2027.

The Role

You'll join a multi‑disciplinary digital engineering team, working closely with developers, SREs, and other engineers to embed quality throughout the software delivery lifecycle. The focus is on automation‑led testing, CI/CD integration, and driving a continuous testing culture.

You will also play a role in mentoring and supporting more junior engineers in test.

Key Responsibilities

Define and deliver automated testing strategies for cloud‑native systems, platforms, and APIs
Design, implement, and maintain test automation frameworks
Embed test stages and quality gates within CI/CD pipelines
Support defect investigation, root‑cause analysis, and resolution
Collaborate with engineering and SRE teams to meet defined SLAs and SLOs
Define testing, release, and quality assurance processes
Set and track quality metrics and measurable outcomes
Promote continuous testing and quality‑first engineering practices
Provide mentoring and coaching to junior engineers in test

Required Experience

5+ years' experience in automated software testing within agile and DevOps environments
Strong understanding of the Software Testing Lifecycle (STLC)
Hands‑on experience with tools such as Selenium, Cypress, Robot Framework, or Postman
Strong programming capability in Java, Python, or another OO language
Experience testing enterprise‑scale, cloud‑native applications
Good knowledge of APIs, microservices, and distributed architectures
Experience with version control systems (Git) and modern CI/CD pipelines
Confident communicator with a collaborative mindset

Nice to Have

BDD experience and Gherkin syntax
Exposure to observability and monitoring tools (Grafana, Prometheus, ELK, Datadog)
Experience with Kubernetes or cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, or GCP)
Experience with relational or NoSQL databases

Working Pattern & Rate

£400 per day (Inside IR35, via umbrella)
Hybrid working: 2-3 days per week onsite in central Manchester
Long‑term contract running through to March 2027If this sounds like a role you'd like to discuss, or if you'd like further details on the client, project, or interview process, please get in touch