Interns willing to pay for work experience
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Sadgrove: demand for work experience
Competition for jobs is so intense that there is “absolutely pent-up demand” among jobseekers to pay an employer for internships, according to the chief executive of Etsio.com, which matches people looking for internships with employers willing to provide them.
Launched in October, Etsio.com co-ordinates arrangements in which interns often pay employers a fee for the work experience.
Kit Sadgrove told Recruiter that interns may be charged between £50 and £200 a day, with £60 day being common. Etsio charges the employers an administration fee when it successfully matches an intern with an employer, then hands the remainder of the fee over to the employer.
Sadgrove said: “There is absolutely pent-up demand from people willing to pay an employer for work experience.
“It is incredibly cheap if you see it as training, considering you are sitting next to a business owner and learning their secrets.”
And referring to the recruitment sector as an example, Sadgrove added: “There are a lot of people who want to get into recruitment but they have no experience, so who is going to take them on? This opens up the opportunities for them, and in return the recruitment agency gets some money.”
Sadgrove added: “If people are keen enough to do this they will go out and flip burgers in order to get the money [they need].”
The service has sparked widely divided reactions. The Employment Agencies Act 1973, the basis for the Conduct of Employment Agencies & Employment Businesses Regulations 2003, prohibits charging work seekers fees for finding them work.
However, Sadgrove argued that paying for an internship was no different than paying for a university education. He said he was confident that the service fell outside the Conduct Regulations.
Kevin Barrow, a partner in Osborne Clarke’s recruitment sector team, told Recruiter: “Many organisations are testing the limits of the prohibition against charging [candidates] for services for the purpose of finding or seeking to find someone employment.”
Commenting on Etsio.com’s business model, Barrow went on to say: “It is possible that EASI [the Employment Agencies Standards Inspectorate] would take the view that this was a charge for work-finding services.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Business Skills & Innovation (BIS) told Recruiter: “If an organisation is caught by the 1973 Act as an ’employment agency’ - finding work for persons with employers - any fee charged to a person (directly or indirectly) in order to be found work would be illegal under section 6(1) of the 1973 Act.”
Liz Longman, the chief executive of TEAM (The Employment Agencies Movement) criticised Etsio’s business model: “I’m sure some people would be willing to pay for good work experience, but…how many unemployed people can afford to pay £130 a day, which is what one of the companies on Etsio.com is asking for?
“At those rates not many people would be able to afford to do it for long to get the amount of valid experience they need.”
Alex Try, co-founder Interns Anonymous, told Recruiter: “Whatever happened to investing in young people, training them up and helping them to realise their potential?”
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Readers' comments (7)
Tanya de Grunwald | Wed, 30 Nov 2011 12:12 pm
A big thank you to Recruiter for covering this story - companies like this should be named and shamed. Effectively, they profit from young people's desperation, which turns my stomach.
I am encouraged that the HR community is taking such an interest in the issue of unpaid internships, which exploit those who do them - and exclude those who can't afford to do them.
It is a myth that unpaid work is the solution to youth unemployment. As the users of my website tell me every single day, it is already a big part of the problem.
Keep up the good work!
Tanya de Grunwald
Founder, GraduateFog.co.uk
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Rachit Jain | Wed, 30 Nov 2011 12:29 pm
I feel this is just one side of the story.. there are employers also who are willing to pay for candidates with internship and some real world experience.. also there are employers who are willing to pay for internship to Youth.. at my site www.youth4work.com i get a lot of both..
I feel if the employer gets a candidate with the relevant internship experience and work-ex of the field of interest of the job profile.. that becomes the best fit..
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Paul Farrer | Wed, 30 Nov 2011 1:34 pm
Unemployed people paying for an internship is quite revolting. Sadgrove says that is no different from paying for University Education. How wrong. An intern adds value to a business - they profit our of the work an intern does - otherwise why have them. An interniship is as or maybe more valuable than a degree but we really have stooped into the gutter if Etsio and others are able to charge people desperately seeking work. It actually means that only those who can pay would get an internship. Those that can afford it probably needs less help then those who can't. It is bad enough that many organisations take people on for free but this is disgusting.I hope Etsio is closed down immediately
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Jonathan Warner | Wed, 30 Nov 2011 5:40 pm
Universities already refuse to advertise internships which don't agree to pay the minimum wage. Thinking that graduates can perform work duties from day 1 is totally unrealistic. Companies large and small need to turn a profit and if that means not employing graduates and school leavers then they won't.
Our company attempted to have interns in but the amount of time and training they need makes it a completely one-sided relationship. Many of these interns went on to use references to apply for jobs later on. I think interns should pay for the experience. They are not being trained in job skills by the universities so they should pay for this from companies.
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Rachael Glaser | Thu, 1 Dec 2011 8:15 am
It is important that if a student is paying for an internship that they get experience that is worthwhile, that they can use to put onto their CVs.
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Steve Ward | Fri, 16 Dec 2011 3:21 pm
This is sickening opportunism.
As I wrote in the below. Internship is a stage of employment, it's not a training course.
Sign the petition, set up by Bill Boorman. This stuff shouldn't be allowed.
http://recruitmentmisfit.com/one-simple-message-dont-charge-the-unemployed
Steve Ward | CloudNine Social Media & Digital Talent
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Paul Thompson - Sales Director Voyager | Tue, 10 Jan 2012 2:35 pm
I had to check this was a true story - amazing.
Although, I can see why recruiting an intern could be extremely time consuming.
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