Are unpaid internships legal?

Binx12

Family member recently had an interview in a VERY well known pharma company and was told the 3 month role is unpaid 😱 Is that even legal??

burtner

Unpaid internships are common in Ireland,

machiavellianme

No one is forcing anyone to do it. It's a great way to get experience if you have none.

28064212

Good summary here: https://gradireland.com/careers-advice/internships/law-unpaid-internships-know-your-rights

Basic summary is that if they're doing actual work, it should be paid. Defining "actual work" and the difference between it and "just learning" is the tricky part.

Of course, the legal position is mostly moot. If the family member attempts to challenge it, they're not going to get the position. If they take the position and try to get paid after the fact, even if they're successful, they're not going to be kept on after the internship.

Binx12

I think the worst part was they took an unpaid day off their current job to attend the interview and then was told the role was unpaid. There was nothing whatsoever about that in the job description 🙄

Jim2007

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122207044#Comment_122207044

I don't know of any country where it is actually illegal to work for free and I suspect you'd find a lot off opposition to the "Government telling me how I can spend my time" brigade. We employed a lot of interns over my years in banking (all paid) and was it a paid position was something most applicants asked up front, so I assume it is something most people know….

Kurooi

I think the real BS here is that this specifically restricts good experience to the wealthy kids. Equality at it's finest all the way through school, college and after you're always overlooked.

tohaltuwi

the idea is that interns are supposed to be getting a bit of an insider look at the broad area of employment they hope to subsequently make a living. They should not be replacing regular paid workers but be learners accommodated in return for taking on a small project or two that is useful to the employer.

cnocbui

The system is being exploited.

My daughter completed an IT degree last year. She got a paid internship as the practical experience part of her course. The companies feedback on her performance was that she 'over-delivered'.

Having graduated as the top student in the course, she has been unable to find a job. Now the internship system can be good, especially as an avenue to getting a first job on graduating, because companies know what the interns are like and might be disposed to taking on those they thought highly of.

Not the case for my daughter, though. The company employs senior developers and interns, with no positions in a hollowed out middle. My son advised her to apply for one of the senior positions thay were advertising, nothing to lose on the face of it, and they replied along the lines of 'oh, we remember you, no, this position is not for you'.

Her mother, a university lecturer involved in delivering some IT units, has been helping her in her search and reports she is finding a lot of IT companies seem similarly structured, with senior positions and nothing below them except interns, but with a few occasionally taking on possibly one person out of 4 crops of interns. This all makes the prospects for IT gradutes fairly bleak.

tohaltuwi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209697#Comment_122209697

I have always been suspicious of exploitation happening, and clearly if as you say is the case with IT companies, that’s pretty woeful. So, they get their entry-level & more routine job tasks done free, and at the other end employ people with years of experience and/postgrad/further training. I imagine AI is only going to expand this middle hollow.

Dial Hard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122206503#Comment_122206503

In my experience, paid ones are far more common than unpaid here. The latter certainly aren't illegal, though.

Augme

Avoid any company that offers unpaid internships. From my experience it always provided an insight into their mindset and attitude to everything else.

Kurooi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209697#Comment_122209697

Because that's all they need, a few seniors who can stand at the ready, answer to and explain stuff to the executives, and then everyone below them is outsourced over in India.

L1011

Some UK owned companies have got the wobbles about offering them due to the UK's Modern Slavery laws; many still do but the generally quite odious UK owned firm I worked for stopped them entirely; and eventually got involved with colleges paid placement schemes to get back the flow of possible hires

Their ones weren't even the outright worst, 50 quid a week for lunches (you could still get a big lunch for a tenner then) and 50 quid a week for transport is better than being expected to ask your parents for pocket money for those on top of everything else; and they did hire nearly everyone but I still couldn't recommend it.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209730#Comment_122209730

Well as I said, in my daughters case her internship was paid. If this were happening with unpaid internships, that would be more concerning, though perfectly legal. It's just part and parcel of the capitalist sytem which precludes any form of morality or ethics. If it makes money, is the sole defining operative criteria.

Advise against your kids doing IT, the market is saturated, with layoffs currently happening in the tens of thousands in the game industry, for example.

manaboutlab

It's the same with most STEM subjects - the only reason to go into STEM right now should be to use it as a springboard into FinTech, investment banking or the like. Doing STEM to land a lab role is putting yourself into servitude.

AndrewJRenko

A family member training to be a chef is doing unpaid internship (internment?) with a fancy Dublin restaurant. Something not right about that, but it seems to be what is required in that sector.

JVince

A paid one is very common, but you are expected to do work and watch and learn but not disrupt the flow too much.

An unpaid internship usually has a very hands on approach and one to one mentoring and learning though experience. In many cases its costs the company money due to the need for a staff member to be training the person, but they hope to get a return by finding out if the internee is a suitable match for the company in a paid role.

If you think you will get a lot of learning and benefit - go for the unpaid role. If you think you are going to be a gofor - decline it

Jim2007

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209641#Comment_122209641

So what is the difference between having the kid at home living of their parents and sittinb around versus getting some experience as an alternative?

28064212

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122219815#Comment_122219815

Who said the kid is sitting at home? The point is that some children can afford to be bankrolled by their families while they spend six months not getting paid. Children from less well-off families cannot afford to do that - they have to take a paid job. And when the unpaid internship is at a prestigious firm (as they often are, since those positions are the most sought after), lower economic classes are locked out

reactadabtc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209697#Comment_122209697

I'm a software engineer. When I was unemplyed in 2019, my mother told me to apply to senior level positions of companies I like just on the off chance they might like me. I was a junior at the time, well I applied for a senior role, the interviewed me, liked me and offered me another yet to be advertised role because they liked me.

It does work. I was suprised it worked, but it absolutely does.

Mrs OBumble

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209568#Comment_122209568

There's something in the back of my mind about a case here where a judge found that it is illegal to have a worker paid less than minimum wage. I can't find the reference right now but am pretty sure it happened.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122219929#Comment_122219929

I'd it's not very common. Usually you won't get past the HR filter..

reactadabtc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122225399#Comment_122225399

Yeah I'd say it's unusual, but still worth the application. Especially these days

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122225683#Comment_122225683

Absolutely.

You never win the chance you don't take.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122209751#Comment_122209751

This is true.

However many industries in Ireland have established a culture of free work experience or internship as a rite of passage. It's basically free labour. As you say it spells volumes about a companies culture.

No shortage of work if you'll work for free. You might have to do it to get a step in the door. But the real talent is getting paid for your labour.