Senior Full-Stack Developer for Live Product

ABOUT THIS ROLE This is a live product, not a prototype. We are a Swiss software publisher. Our platform handles reservations and floor management for restaurants — real venues, real bookings, paying customers, running in production today. We have two releases to ship: one in September, one on 1 January 2027. Both dates are firm. We are bringing in senior engineering capacity to get there, and we intend to keep working with the right person well beyond those dates. What we offer is straightforward: a defined scope, direct contact with the decision-maker — no account manager, no committee, no three-day wait for an answer — and a codebase that already works and already earns. What we ask is equally straightforward: that you can read someone else's code without insisting on rewriting it, that you tell us plainly when we are wrong, and that you hit dates. If you are looking for a quick gig, this is not it. If you are looking for a client you can still be working with in two years, keep reading. STACK Backend — Node.js 18+, Express, MariaDB/MySQL (mysql2), JWT auth Frontend — React + Vite Payments — Stripe (Checkout Sessions, Customer Portal, webhooks) Email — Nodemailer / SMTP Hosting — Linux, SSH access, no container orchestration FIRST ASSIGNMENT (paid, ~25-30 hours) — TECHNICAL AUDIT — STARTS THIS WEEK We start every collaboration with one scoped, paid assignment. Our platform has two reservation management views: - a timeline/grid view (tables as rows, time slots as columns) - a 2D floor-plan view (visual room layout) The backend already exposes the required endpoints (rooms, tables, reservation move + move logs, availability slots). What we need is an honest technical assessment of the frontend and of the business logic consistency. Deliverables: 1. Timeline view — functional audit - Drag & drop of a reservation between tables: is the existing move endpoint actually wired to the UI? - Overlap / double-booking detection - Table combination (two 2-seaters merged into one 4-seater) - Service rotation (two seatings on the same table in one evening) - Walk-in creation from the view - Tablet usability — this is the real-world use case, not desktop 2. 2D floor-plan view — feasibility assessment - Do the table records currently store x/y coordinates? If not, what does the migration look like? - What exists today vs. what needs to be built - Realistic hour estimate for a production-ready editor 3. Written report (2-3 pages) - What works, what is broken, what is missing - Prioritised list: blocking / important / nice-to-have - Your honest estimate for each We want a real assessment, not reassurance. If the code is bad, say so. If this goes well, we move to an ongoing engagement (20-25 h/week) through December. WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR Required - 5+ years of professional full-stack JavaScript experience - Solid SQL, comfortable with schema migrations on a live database - Comfortable with SSH, environment variables and server-side debugging - Experience with Stripe subscriptions - Fluent written English - European timezone (CET +/- 3 hours) — we want real-time overlap Strong plus - French (working language on our side, but English is fine) - Experience taking over an undocumented codebase - Multi-tenant SaaS experience Not a fit - Agencies subcontracting the work - Teams operating behind a single freelancer profile - "I can do everything" generalist proposals HOW WE WORK - NDA signed before any repository access - You work on a dedicated branch; every change is reviewed before merge - One 30-minute sync call per week, async the rest of the time - All work is invoiced through Upwork - Full IP assignment on all delivered work COMMITMENT Start date: immediately. The first assignment is ready to begin as soon as the NDA is signed — we are not waiting on internal approvals, budget cycles or anything else. This is a deadline-driven engagement. We ship a first release in November and a second on 1 January 2027. If you cannot commit 20 h/week from now through December, please do not apply. Rate is negotiable and based on experience. Please state your rate in your proposal. TO APPLY Please start your proposal with the word ORANGE, and in ONE sentence, tell us what you consider the riskiest part of the first assignment. Proposals that do not follow this instruction will not be reviewed. Do not send a generic portfolio. Tell us about one relevant project you built, and one thing that went wrong with it. Include your hourly rate and how many hours per week you can start with this week.