Trainee deferrals: Herbert Smith offers £8k for six months
03 April 2009
More firms have been contacting their trainees and asking them to defer the start of their training contracts - but the variation in the terms on offer is huge.
Some firms are offering a genuinely good deal on a voluntary basis. Top of the table is Herbert Smith which has offered students £7,000 to defer for six months, with up to another grand if they do something useful like learning a language. It's entirely voluntary although the firm says that, unsurprisingly, there has been a "very strong uptake". And Travers Smith has matched Norton Rose's healthy £10,000 for a year's deferral. It's also voluntary with no strings attached.
Most firms are a notch below, offering £5,000 for a year on a (more or less) voluntary basis - although some seem to be leaning quite heavily on their future trainees to accept the offer.
But then there are some tightwads - and a shameless few who are actually forcing their students to defer. Reed Smith has followed Lovells' line of forcing trainees to defer for six months in exchange for £2,500. Apparently its entire August intake of 32 trainees have been told to make themselves scarce. Walker Morris has told half of its intake to defer for a year for just £3,000. The firm stresses that the cost of living in Leeds is lower than that in London - which would make some sense if the firm only selected trainees who already live in Leeds.
Then there's McClure Naismith which forced half its new trainees to defer for a year with no compensation at all. But bottom of the heap, by a country mile, is Shoosmiths. The firm asked its future trainees to "volunteer" to defer for up to two years or, how about this, just abandon their jobs altogether. With no compensation. The firm has said that if it doesn't get enough volunteers (and who's going to, frankly) it will make deferrals compulsory.
| Position |
Firm |
Offer |
| 1 |
Herbert Smith |
£7k for six months, an extra £1k to learn a language etc. |
| 2 |
Simmons & Simmons |
£15k p.a. to undertake a MBA |
| 3 |
Clifford Chance |
up to £11k p.a. (£8k basic plus £3k to undertake pro bono etc) |
| 4 |
Travers Smith |
£10k p.a., no strings |
| 5 |
Norton Rose |
up to £10k p.a. depending on what students do with their time |
| 6 |
Olswang |
£7k p.a. or £3.5k for six months |
| 6 |
Pinsent Masons |
£5k p.a. |
| 8 |
Baker & McKenzie |
£5k p.a. |
| 8 |
DLA Piper |
£5k p.a. |
| 8 |
Dundas & Wilson |
£5k p.a. |
| 8 |
Penningtons |
£5k p.a. |
| 12 |
Lovells |
£2.5k for six months, compulsory |
| 12 |
Reed Smith |
£2.5k for six months, compulsory |
| 14 |
Walker Morris |
£3k p.a. compulsory |
| 15 |
McClure Naismith |
Absolutely nothing for a year, compulsory |
| 16 |
Shoosmiths |
Absolutely nothing for up to two years, compulsory if people don't volunteer - and actually, how about just resigning before you start? |
A spokeswoman for Shoosmiths said "
our future trainees are still in a better position than many as they retain the training contract offer - some firms have rescinded their offer altogether". Although, when questioned by RollOnFriday interrogators, she couldn't actually name any firm that had done this. And she confirmed that while Shoosmiths had no current plans to rescind training contracts, it had indeed asked its future trainees to consider packing in their jobs.
In the meantime, one future trainee has launched a petition to try to force Shoosmiths to behave with some shred of decency. RollOnFriday would be interested to hear from any employment lawyers willing to offer pro bono advice to the students - click here to get in touch.