What are your thoughts on unpaid work experience?

Would you be up for it as you'd be getting the experience that will help with your future career, or do you think that it is exploitative of companies to not pay interns for their work?

I think to do an unpaid internship full-time for 6 months with no pay is exploitative because people are giving up so much of their time to work for no money and not even getting the minimum wage or anything and after the expense of going to university need the money. If people do an unpaid internship part-time for a few months then it's not exploitation but then doing a lot of unpaid work will give you plenty of experience.

I have been offered a two months internship at a law firm, which is also unpaid. However, I am prepared to sacrifice my time as it will boost my CV and allow me to gain vital insight into the legal profession. Six months, however, is a rather long time, so it's worth carefully weighing up pros and cons.

I think internships are a great way to make you stand out from the crowd - particularly in this competitive market. You may not get paid but if you get an internship with a well known company and get exposure across the business then the CV enhancement is priceless. I'm currently looking around for just such an opportunity and see that Comic Relief are looking for interns to help with Sport Relief - as a Marketing grad that would be a great addition to my CV!

If you have nothing else going at the moment, what harm does it do to add something to your CV for the sake of it?

I would do an unpaid internship as I am desperate to get around the Catch-22 of not being able to get experience! In the long run it should pay off and hopefully there will be people to support you as you go...I realise this isn't always the case though. If you're financially secure enough to do it, I say go for it.

Unpaid internships are taking the mick. Employers just use them to exploit graduates and students desperate to get a foot on the ladder - often when pressured with enormous debt! I know so many people who simply can't afford to do them even though they would love the experience.

The thing that is wrong with unpaid internships is that it means that graduates from wealthy backgrounds will be able to do them and get good work experience while  graduates who have rent to pay will be forced to take a job stacking shelves in Tesco.

I have seen unpaid internships lasting 12 months on this website, I think that is definately wrong and exploitive and too long to work for no pay. What do you think of doing an unpaid internship for 12 months?

Check out the latest story on Milkround about a minimum wage for internships:

http://www.milkround.com/news-careers-advice/222336/Internship-training-wage-would-end-exploitation

What do you think? I support this - it's slave labour asking people to work for nothing, especially if they are from a poorer background!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10434464.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8355714.stm

"The search for the dream job means that some are exploited during work experience, according to campaigners."  Of  course internships should be paid.

I think that if you are doing an unpaid internship for longer than 3 months you should be allowed to have the option of it being part time in order to work and earn some money the rest of the time. Living expenses not to mention travel expenses are just too high and I don't think it is fair that recent graduates should be expected to work for free especially as we've already spent thousands of pounds on getting a degree we were led to think would lead to paid employment. Even if they offer £50 a week for travel expenses when it's over £2000 a year to commute it barely skims the surface. We all need to take a stand and say no to unpaid work, we deserve to get paid at least minimum wage for all the time and effort we put in.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/jobs/7920381/Employers-warned-that-unpaid-internships-could-break-law.html

It is thought that unpaid internships are breaking the law, the National Minimum Wage legislation.

I think there is a lot to be gained from unpaid internships and can often help on the ladder. I graduated last year and have already been offered a partnership at the small legal firm that I interned at before my studies.

I think there is a lot to be gained from unpaid internships and can often help on the ladder. I graduated last year and have already been offered a partnership at the small legal firm that I interned at before my studies.

Hi Everyone

There are some other useful sites regarding internship.

Interns Anonymous
http://internsanonymous.co.uk/

Rights for Interns
http://www.rightsforinterns.org.uk/

Jay

http://www.careeristconnected.com/forum/topic/22

I think that even if it is illegal, the people applying for internships are entering the agreement willfully in return for experience.  I think experience can have more value than the monetary and as long as the deal is kept to on both sides, then it is down to indivual discretion.

From my view, it all depends. I mean if you learn a lot from the experience then why not. Money should not dictate everything that you choose. If you are wise with the pennies then why not foke out with a few months. If you learn then it will pay off in spades. If your anti-internship then by all means look for a job as opposed to an internship. In the states the've had internships going for decades. Round here it still a new thing. At the end of the day it's your chocie whether you are pro-internship or anti-internship and whether you are prepared to put the social life away for a couple of months, learn a lot of business skills and then hunt down a good job aftewards. Well this is just me though.