Intern

Intern is a description, not a legal status

An intern usually joins an organisation for a limited period to gain experience, but the word itself creates no separate employment category. The person's rights follow the real arrangement. They might be a worker, an employee, a genuine volunteer or someone completing an exempt student placement.

Look at what both sides have agreed and what happens in practice. Regular duties, fixed hours, personal service, supervision, payment or a promise of future work can point towards worker status. Calling the position unpaid, educational or voluntary does not remove minimum-wage entitlement if the legal test is met.

The GOV.UK guidance for interns sets out the main distinctions.

Separate learning from free labour

Work shadowing, where someone observes and performs no work, is different from an intern carrying out useful tasks. A required placement of less than a year as part of a UK further- or higher-education course can also fall within a specific minimum-wage exemption. Neither exception should be stretched to cover an ordinary productive role.

The official work-experience guidance makes the employer responsible for deciding whether the person is a worker and whether a real exemption applies.

Write down the arrangement you actually mean

Before the placement starts, record its purpose, dates, activities, supervision, hours, expenses and any learning outcomes. Decide employment status and pay from those facts. If the arrangement changes, revisit the decision rather than relying on the original title.

Avoid promising paid work as a reward for completing an unpaid placement. A promise of future work can itself be relevant to worker status. Keep internships short enough to serve a clear learning purpose, but remember that duration alone does not decide whether pay is due.