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JAY BOY

Member Since: 04 May 2010
Location: Not here
Posts: 1706

We take on apprentices on a bi-anual basis. We ask young candidates for CV's and choose quite a few for interview, I do ask then if there willing to work a weeks trial for free. We would never let them work for free but it does give you an insight to their commitment. If you're running a successful business why would you want free labour, i think its outrageous for people to expect it along with 0 hours contracts.
We do expect our lads to use some their wages in the first three months to buy some hand tools. This also shows that they have some sort of commitment to our investment.

14th Sep 2017 6:12pm

walfy

Member Since: 29 Aug 2007
Location: Frome
Posts: 2673

I'm with the majority on here. I run my own company and have had to do free days. When I was starting out it was fine, I was paid expenses but no wage and it was only for a day. So I lived with it.
I then applied for a contract conducting H&S audits/visits in London. Day rate was discussed and that I would have to do a trial day. It was never mentioned that the trial day was FoC. So I tramped off to London, spent the day conducting a visit on Chelsea town hall. Went home, wrote my report. I sent my invoice in including train fare and day rate. Payment was made, they returned my invoice having made changes to it and said that was the invoice they would process.
So I fired up the laptop, sent them an email thanking them for the payment, and then deleted the report. I had no intention of working for a company that wanted to not pay me for a days work and more importantly who were willing to amend my invoice and tell me thats what they were paying.
Not heard a thing from them since.
Strange thing is, I looked at the blokes Linked in profile, he left the Army same year as me (2011) and completed his NEBOSH 2yrs later. But then his profile says he's been involved in H&S for 25 yrs. WHich meant that he was involved in H&S the day he joined the Army, even though we had crown exemption at the time. So just about sums the company up in my eyes 110 D250 SE HT
110 USW SOLD
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Polaris RZR 900XP SOLD

14th Sep 2017 7:16pm

Teario

Member Since: 04 Aug 2015
Location: Merseyside
Posts: 153

It's not just interns who work for free in the game industry. I'd never work for free now and would never expect anyone else to, but it unfortunately took me many nights sleeping at my desk to realise that.

Then again my opinion is a little bit more complicated.

When interviewing people for software roles at the studio I work for now, it is painfully obvious which of those have experience and which don't. Not just in terms of their programming ability but just their general attitude and approach to problems. It's really obvious after asking a question, which ones are solving it in the context of having worked on a team, to a deadline, for a product that is shipping to the general public and which ones are solving it in the context of having done some hobby work and made sure their coursework runs on the Uni computers.

So with that in mind, it's better to have experience and while it's possible to find that through a paid internship, if your only option is unpaid it might be more beneficial in the long run. But who knows the quality of the experience you'll get at somewhere that doesn't even want to pay you? It's a tough decision. The place I work now offers paid internships, but we only really take them on if we know someone is going to be able to properly mentor them. Nobody is going to benefit if we just put them in the corner doing busywork, so we just stick them on a project and treat them like any other member of the team. That tends to work well for everyone involved and so far every one of them has come back at the end of their degree.

15th Sep 2017 8:48pm

BLACK LAB

Member Since: 07 Dec 2016
Location: AYRSHIRE
Posts: 165

No work should go unpaid . Anybody who offers to work for free or a lower than recoginised rate for the said work is a rat . 2006 DEFENDER 90 TD5 CSW XS
2018 RANGE ROVER SPORT HSE DYNAMIC

16th Sep 2017 7:47am

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