TSYS|Total System Services Software Engineer Interview Questions
& Process

The interview process was a bit all over the place. First, there was an online technical MCQ round. Then, a technical interview where the interviewer seemed really busy, doing it while working. They asked about Java and OOP, connecting it to my project. The last round was an HR round, super short, like 10 minutes. They mentioned that if you were on the fence, another round might happen. They don't really stick to a standard process and might have anywhere from 3 to 5 rounds in total. They also didn't say anything about a PPO offer.

For the Java/Microservices profile, there was 1 HackerRank test, followed by 2 technical rounds, and finally 1 Managerial round. The HackerRank test had 3 programming questions about DSA, and they were a bit harder than average. The 2 technical interviews were tough because they were purely focused on programming skills with no verbal questions at all. Strong problem-solving and coding abilities are essential. The last round, the managerial one, was easy; it was just a chat about roles, responsibilities, the company's background, and its projects.

Applied online for this entry-level role geared towards recent grads, and the whole thing took about 3-4 weeks. First up was a phone screen, then a virtual behavioral interview. After that, there was a really long 4-hour in-person interview and test. The initial screens were pretty straightforward, but that 4-hour session was intense. The in-person part had this huge influx of candidates, mostly from Indian/Southeast Asian and Asian backgrounds, which seemed to be reflected in the current staff too. One manager apparently recruited heavily from UGA. A 'walk-in' candidate was even allowed, which felt weird given the pre-screening for others. There was a lack of diversity in the candidate pool overall. The test itself was a 30+ page thing covering various languages and concepts, with some tough coding problems that seemed impossible to finish. The actual in-person interview was rough. The interviewer seemed dismissive of my bootcamp background and my ongoing CS degree, and really picked apart my professional experience, trying to link a tech support role to a dev position. They didn't ask about problem-solving skills but seemed unimpressed with my previous employer. For a college hire role, they should have asked more about what I'm doing now, but instead kept asking if I'd done specific programming tasks at my current job, even after I explained my role. I had to keep redirecting to school projects and personal projects to show examples of setup, collaboration, and issues. In the situational questions, the interviewer seemed to deliberately misunderstand and interrupt me. For instance, when asked about helping a collaborator, I detailed helping a bootcamp peer with database queries, providing resources, and connecting them to an instructor when direct help didn't work. The interviewer fixated on the instructor's involvement and dismissed my role. Several other questions went similarly. Finally, when asked about continuous learning, I mentioned books, blogs, and online platforms like Udemy and YouTube. Again, the interviewer acted unfamiliar with Udemy and questioned how one could truly learn or get hands-on coding experience through such services, seeming unconvinced by my explanation of exercises and projects on these platforms. They never asked about my GitHub or portfolio, or listened to my responses about the projects I've built. Honestly, it feels like a waste of time since they seemed to have no real intention of considering me.