You find a serious bug an hour before a release. What do you do?
Tell the lead or release owner immediately with clear details on what breaks, how to reproduce it and how many users it affects, suggest options such as a fix, a rollback plan or delaying, and let the decision-maker decide.
Explain it simply
Freshers sometimes stay quiet because they do not want to delay the release or look wrong. But shipping a serious bug can cost far more: failed payments, angry users, a weekend of fixes.
Your job is to raise it clearly and quickly with evidence, not to decide alone whether the release happens. Give the facts, suggest options, and help with whatever is decided.
Example
Situation: In his internship, Abhay noticed during a final check that the new checkout page charged GST twice for certain coupon orders.
Task: Make sure the right people knew before the release.
Action: He reproduced it twice, took screenshots with the order totals, and messaged the release lead and his mentor immediately, explaining the steps and that every order using a percentage coupon would be affected. He suggested disabling coupons for the release or delaying by a day.
Result: The lead disabled percentage coupons for the release, the fix went out the next morning, and no customer was overcharged.
What to say in the interview
"I'd immediately inform the release owner with exact steps, screenshots and impact, suggest options like a delay or disabling the feature, and help with whatever they decide."
Common mistakes
- Staying quiet to avoid delaying the release.
- Fixing it yourself in production without telling anyone.
- Reporting it vaguely without evidence.