Senior Backend Node.js Developer

Our client is a travel tech startup that helps users automatically save money on flights and hotel bookings. The platform monitors booked reservations and, if the price drops, rebooks or secures a refund so users get the savings without any manual effort. The product integrates with users’ email to track bookings and works with major airlines and hotels worldwide. The company operates on a performance-based model, taking only a percentage of the savings it generates.

Requirements

Must-have skills

• Node.js — 5+ years of commercial experience
• Express.js — building REST APIs, middleware, routing
• MongoDB — Mongoose ODM, aggregations, indexing, query optimization
• Redis — caching, pub/sub, queues
• Testing — writing unit and integration tests (Mocha, Chai, Supertest or similar)
• Git — branching, code review, merge requests
• REST API — design and third-party integrations

Nice-to-have skills

• TypeScript — typing, migrating JS projects to TS
• GCP (Google Cloud Platform) — Cloud Run, KMS, Cloud Storage
• OpenSearch/Elasticsearch — full-text search, indexing
• REDIS — cache, queues
• Socket.io/WebSockets — real-time communication
• Gmail API / Google APIs — OAuth 2.0, email processing
• Stripe — payment integration, webhooks
• Twilio — SMS notifications
• Cheerio — HTML parsing
• Handlebars — email templating

Would be a plus

• Knowledge of queue patterns and background job processing
• Experience with Passport.js (JWT, OAuth)
• Understanding of web application security principles (OWASP)

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain backend services on Node.js
• Write automated tests for new and existing code
• Integrate with third-party APIs (payment systems, email services, SMS)
• Optimize performance and scalability
• Work with MongoDB database, Redis storage and OpenSearch engine
• Conduct code reviews and participate in technical discussions
• Work with existing codebase, refactoring

Tech Stack

• Runtime: Node.js 22
• Framework: Express.js
• Database: MongoDB (Mongoose)
• Search: OpenSearch
• Cache: Redis
• Real-time: Socket.io
• Cloud: GCP (Cloud Run)
• Auth: Passport.js (JWT, Google OAuth 2.0)
• Payments: Stripe
• Email: Gmail API, Resend
• SMS: Twilio
• Testing: Mocha, Chai, Supertest, Sinon
• Validation: Joi, Zod
• Logging: Winston