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      Ocado Group

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      Software Engineer Interview

      Sep 27, 2012
      Anonymous Interview Candidate
      Hatfield, East of England, England
      No offer
      Negative experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Ocado Group (Hatfield, East of England, England) in Aug 2012

      Interview

      I was put on to Ocado's interview from a recruiter. The first stage was to complete an online Codility.com test (3 tests). You can choose in the tool which programming language you'd like to use. (c++, java, etc.. there's quite a few). The questions weren't trivial. The first was somewhat similar to how you might program mode or median, however #2 and #3 were more difficult. #2 invoved finding a particular sequence in an array and #3 involved finding a sum of specific values in a matrix. I ran out of time on this 3rd question, but put in the headers of the functions so that they could see what I was going to write.. this seemed adequate. (As a side note, the recruier had told me that the tests would be find the mean, mode and median, so I was a little surprised how much more difficult it was when I went to do it. So beware they do seem to change the codility questions.) I got through to the next round, which involved going to the HQ (Hatfield). They sit you in a room with the other candidates and you sit 2 tests (paper). The first is using a made-up language which is somewhat like assembly, but not as difficult. You have to complete (fill-in) functions, which create other functions (might be 'greater than' for example) which you can then use in subsequent questions. The second test is just a simple java test involving a linked-list. Insertion/removal/reversal. etc. If you get through that stage they take you on a tour of the factory (quite impressive). After that you have a chat with a manager. Then you go home. Then if you get through you have to go in again for the 'final round', whereby you have a chat with 2 managers, then 1 manager. (heads of the different departments). The first chat you might have to write some code on the white board. (I had a disagreement with one of them about object-orientation during this stage, see the end of this text..) After that you go home. Then finally you get told that after passing all these tests that you're not a good technical fit. As I partially commented on with the manager, it seems that Ocado have some kind of problem with their recruitment. They say they can't find good people (they are opening an office in Poland due to this), however it's evident having gone through the process that they don't know what they're looking for, or what they're looking for is unrealistic. The fact that they have "interview days" every Friday and the fact that all these people that have passed their tests and have good backgrounds don't get offers should be ringing alarm bells for someone there. Ocado are mostly a Java shop (minor c# also) as well as web. The people there all seemed nice (apart from one guy that was a pedant and seemed to think that object orientation was inherently "better" (even with everything as 'public') than a non-OO solution for a very simple problem, despite my reasoned arguments to the contrary. Also, they seemed overly obsessed with questions about threading and synchronisation. ) I would be wary of going for an interview with Ocado as I suspect you will be wasting your time. Then again, you might be just the the Ocadoclone they're looking for.

      Interview questions [3]

      Question 1

      There were no 'difficult' questions as such.
      Answer question

      Question 2

      How would you implement a garbage collector?
      Answer question

      Question 3

      How do you ensure that variables are safe when there are two threads involved
      2 Answers
      7

      Other Software Engineer Interview Reviews for Ocado Group

      Software Engineer Interview

      May 30, 2026
      Anonymous Interview Candidate
      London, England
      Declined offer
      Positive experience
      Easy interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Ocado Group (London, England)

      Interview

      its simple and good had 3 stages online call and in plant interview with hiring managers its simple and good had 3 stages online call and in plant interview with hiring managers

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Tell me about your self and nothing much
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      Software Engineer Interview

      Mar 2, 2026
      Anonymous employee
      Accepted offer
      Positive experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Ocado Group

      Interview

      Smooth process. Multiple rounds including coding, pair programming and behavioral and nice interview. The questions were good if you practice, pair programming is extensive. The last round is with behaviour

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Coding question with live problem
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      Software Engineer Interview

      Apr 27, 2025
      Anonymous employee
      Accepted offer
      Neutral experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I interviewed at Ocado Group

      Interview

      4 stages, technical questions (java, immutable, async programming, collections) coding (algorithms, sorting, grouping, writing tests) system design (link shortener service, questions about performance, scalability, storage) speak with manager and team leader

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      How is HashMap working under the hood
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