Summer Intern - Personal Banking Review

I enjoyed the internship a lot. Some of this is due to the novelty probably but I definitely enjoyed my time here. The other interns were great and the social scene in London was fantastic. The work I was doing was interesting and actually utilized by the company - not just filler work to pass my time.

Very valued - the work that I was doing was actually used by my team and I could see some of the graphs that I had made used in the decks in external presentations. My intern collegaues were also fantastic, especially in the group presentations which we had to complete, everyone was professional and useful.

Not as much as some of the other interns. My manager was not based at the same location as me so I only saw him once a week. I emailed him ofter though. I never felt undersupervised and he was always available for support if I needed it. My immediate team was very small in London, just one other person, so the days that he wasn't here I was a little bit on my own but never out of depth.

I was very busy, especially towards the end of the internship when my projects and presentations were coming to completion. Never too busy though that I was struggling - the right amount. At the beginning I was less busy but it builds as you get more responsabilty and less oversight.

A fair amount, I think more than a lot of the other interns had. I was given two projects that were basically just mine to figure out. With support, of course, but the emphasis was on me to plan and execute my own project. This was the case pretty much from the first day but obviously the supervision at the beginning was a lot more.

Many of my skills, especially inter-team communication, presentation skills and networking were definitely developed during my time here. The skills I learned here are probably not going to help me much in my degree but it was very interesting to get a taste of a professional work environment for the first time.

Very quiet. There is a different vibe on every floor but mine was quite subdued. May have something to do with the age of the people. In personal banking the age is slightly older than in other parts of the bank such as Barclaycard and so people are less prone to chatting.

Not very well towards the end. At the beginning it seemed well structured but towards the end a lot of rumours were circulating re: grad. offers and it seemed that HR didn't fully know what was going on. A lot of this is due to the massive restructring that happens at a big corporation but it seemed a bit shambolic.

A lot - they had talks given by Directors and MDs every Friday that we were strongly encouraged to attend. Other days were organised by other interns. We only had a day and a half training at the beginning which seemed less than other companies but in Personal it was all that was really needed. There was not a lot of company sponsered networking events though

Very appealing. Internal hiring sturctures means that once you are in the company it is fairly easy to progress. Certain areas are better than others however i.e. personal is harder that IB purely due to rate of turn over, For me personally it depends on the department and the side of the business - I don't think personal banking is for me, not fast paced enough.

Yes definitely. The other BUK interns were mostly great. We had some nights out in Shoreditch. The social scene depends on how much you put into it though. There were some interns that you hardly ever saw and some that went out every night same as in any other social context. There were always people up for doing some in an evening, even if it was just a drink in Canary Wharf.

Cost of living is quite expensive but this is expected in London. My rent was £160 a month but had good DLR links so was quite decent. Drinks in Canary Wharf were obviously very expensive £5.50 a pint in the closest bars. Most people would only have one and then move elsewhere for others

All right as long as you like bars and don't mind paying a fair amount. There wasn't a great variety but everyone had there favourites. Almost entirely bars and these were basically the same. Canary Wharf doesn't really have a 'scene' as such, if people wanted to go out they would go Shoreditch or Soho.

For some people: yes. Many of the team or divisions put on activities such as Beach Volleyball or Dodgeball. Mine didn't. There were activities set up amonst the interns though such as football and golf at the driving range. Fully depends on your team and social circle though. My team wasn't that great at organising this sort of thing though.