Job Description

? Bring 3-5 years of full-stack engineering experience in user-facing products
?? Build and optimise full-stack systems powering a large-scale travel platform
? Leverage AI and automation to improve development workflows and product capabilities
? Work cross-functionally with Product, Design, and Engineering from idea to launch
? V&A Waterfront, Cape Town (hybrid)
LekkeSlaap is South Africa's leading accommodation booking app known for its user-friendliness, exceptional customer experience, and extensive local accommodation options. Owned by Tripco, a travel technology company based in the V&A Waterfront, Cape Town. LekkeSlaap is committed to innovation, best-in-class customer service, and setting new standards in travel technology.
As an Intermediate Full Stack Software Engineer at Tripco, you'll be a part of a close-knit Product & Engineering team, building and optimising the technology that powers our products. You'll work across the full technology stack, delivering high-quality, scalable, and maintainable solutions enhancing the travel booking experience for millions of users. From backend architecture to front-end performance, you'll collaborate with cross-functional teams to bring ideas to life while ensuring our systems are secure, efficient, and future-ready.
You'll also play an active role in leveraging AI-driven tools and automation to improve development efficiency, optimise internal processes, and enhance product capabilities as the industry continues to evolve.
Our Stack
You'll work with a diverse and modern technology ecosystem, including:

• Core Stack: Backend - PHP (Laravel), Frontend - Twig/HTML/CSS/JavaScript (React), MySQL (MariaDB), Redis, and Nginx
• Additional Languages: Python, C++, and Rust for performance-critical and specialised microservices
• AI, Data & Automation: Active use of AI-driven tools, automation, and data-informed solutions to improve internal systems, development workflows, and product capabilities
• Infrastructure: Containerised apps using HashiCorp's Nomad, Consul, Vault, and Terraform on a self-managed multi-server environment.
• CI/CD: Docker and GitHub Actions for automated builds, testing, and deployments.

Responsibilities

• Application Development: Design, build, test, and deploy scalable and maintainable web applications across the full stack.
• Performance & Security: Optimise system performance and implement secure coding practices that meet industry standards and protect customer data.
• Code Quality: Participate in peer code reviews, maintaining high standards for maintainability, readability, and test coverage.
• Stakeholder Engagement: Partner with product managers, designers, and other developers to translate business needs into technical solutions.
• Problem Resolution: Diagnose and resolve software bugs, bottlenecks, and performance issues quickly and effectively.
• Documentation: Maintain clear, practical technical documentation that captures system context and business logic to support ongoing development and long-term maintainability.
• Continuous Improvement: Contribute to the continuous improvement of tools, frameworks, and practices to enhance development efficiency and product quality.
• Automation & AI Enablement: Actively identify opportunities to introduce automation and AI-assisted solutions across the development lifecycle, from testing and deployments to internal tooling and workflows, and product features for our guests & hosts.
• Platform Independence: Develop solutions with a platform-agnostic mindset to support long-term scalability and flexibility.
• Product feature ownership: Take full ownership of features, and collaborate across departments to ensure successful integration.

Requirements
Behavioural competencies

• Collaboration: Thrives in a team environment, working efficiently across multiple disciplines and fostering a culture of shared goals.
• Problem-solving mindset: Approaches challenges with a doer mentality, balancing analysis, planning, and hands-on execution to deliver results.
• Adaptability: Open and eager to learn new technologies, including emerging AI and automation tools, as the tech landscape evolves
• Urgency & ownership: Manages workload effectively, makes confident decisions, and takes full ownership of deliverables.
• Continuous learning: Proactively keeps skills and knowledge current to remain ahead of industry trends, with a strong interest in AI-driven development practices.
• Attention to quality: Committed to delivering high-quality, secure, and maintainable code.

Functional experience & competencies

• 3-5 years of proven experience as a Full Stack Software Engineer or similar role, ideally within a web-based, high-traffic, user-facing product environment
• Proficiency in our stack, or similar technologies, as outlined above
• Familiarity with software design principles, coding best practices, and scalable architecture
• Experience with version control systems, particularly Git
• Keen interest in using AI tools and automation to improve productivity, code quality, and development workflows

Bonus if you have:

• Good eye for UI/UX design and experience with relevant tools (eg. Figma).
• Experience or strong interest in Machine Learning, Data Analytics, or data-driven product development.
• Prior exposure to AI-powered features, automation tooling, or intelligent systems.
• Comfortable with the terminal, Linux and Git.
• Hands-on experience with containerisation (Docker) and orchestration tools (eg. Nomad/Kubernetes).
• Exposure to continuous integration and deployment pipelines (eg. Github Actions).
• Experience with cloud platforms such as AWS and infrastructure-as-code (eg. Terraform).
• Understanding of the web infrastructure--DNS, HTTP, SSL, loadbalancing, etc.

Benefits

• Hybrid work model & flexible start times
• Free lunch when in office
• Modern offices based at the V&A Waterfront
• Showers on site
• Travel vouchers and discounts
• Discovery medical aid contributions & Vitality Health membership
• Retirement annuity contributions
• High-end laptops and workstation setup for both in-office and WFH
• Team budget for learning, online courses, and developer conferences
• Generous leave package
• Half-day off every month
• Digital nomad month (work from anywhere)
• Regular team events and more!

We are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive workplace and encourage applications from all suitably qualified candidates, including persons with disabilities.

Skills Required