Tax - Private Clients Sector Review

The internship was very insightful and I was exposed to a wide variety of tasks and got to work with numerous different people within my team. All my colleagues made me feel very welcome and were open to answering any questions that I had about their experience at BDO so far. I would highly recommend anybody looking for a summer internship to apply to BDO.

Over the 6 weeks I was given more and more responsibility. Initially I was given training tasks to do and case studys to give me an understanding of the work which was involved in the day to day life. Once I had completed this my colleagues would give me work and help me with anything I did not understand.

I was paired up with 2 buddies at the start of my internship. These are 2 colleagues in your team that started work at BDO recently and know what it is to be like in your situation. This really makes you feel at home as you can go to them and talk to them about anything which you might be concerned about. Additionally you have a counselling manager who makes sure you are getting enough work and takes time every week to catch up with you to ask how you are finding the experience and what else you might like to work on.

At the start of the internship I was mostly doing a lot of training work and watching videos to get my up to speed with what type of work I would be dealing with on a daily basis so I didnt feel like I had too much to do. However as the weeks progressed I was introduced to more and more work and therefore became much more busy as people could trust me with more work.

At the start of my experience I didn't have a lot of responsibility and was mainly checking through pieces of work as well as reading documents which would give me information on how the workplace runs. However as the weeks progressed I was given more work and taught more things which allowed me to take on more responsibility. By the end of my experience I felt I had significantly more responsibility than I did at the start.

By studying maths at university and having an internship involving tax, I feel a lot of the skills I learnt during my internship could easily be transferred to my degree. For example I have been introduced to different ways about thinking about certain problems. Furthermore as I am looking to continue as a tax graduate I do feel the training I received will gear me up for the working world.

The office was always buzzing and everybody got along with each other very well. It made me feel at home all the time and really enjoyed coming into work everyday. At the office we hotdesk which is a very good idea as it means I got to meet a lot of different people during my experience. I felt the atmosphere at BDO was extremely warm and couldnt have asked for anything better.

The set up was very well organised. All the interns spent the first week in Birmingham where we took an induction course into the department we had applied to. We were also given a project to work on over the 6 weeks and in the final week we all met in the London office to present our presentations to one another. Considering the amount of travel we had to do I think it was very well organised as everything ran smoothly.

In the first week we were given an induction into our department so a lot of colleagues took time out of their schedules to help us learn about the work we would be doing in the following weeks. In the following weeks as well, when I was introduced to certain tasks I was told why we were doing it and the details about how certain calculations were carried out. I do believe the company did invest a lot of time for development into me.

I think the employment prospects are very promising. The departments are growing and there is also a large demand in the tax sector for skilled workers. BDO offer a graduate scheme as well as apprenticeships and summer internships which would gear you up to working for them once you finish university. If you show them your skills during your time there you are likely to be given an offer.

There were a lot of socials during my experience. There were drinks on Fridays as well as casual team meet ups. There was also a football tournament with all firms across the country invited to join. Additionally there was a softball tournament between the departments within the London group which gets people together.

As I lived from home I do not know what the cost of living would have been. But I did have a long commute in the morning which took over an hour door to door. However a lot of people who lived in central London had a much shorter commute and is something which would be more appealing.

Having only spent 6 weeks on the internship I do not have much information on what the nightlife was like in the area. However the interns always went out on a Friday night to the local pub for drinks and the surrounding areas always seemed to have a buzz about them.

As mentioned above there was a softball tournament and a football tournament which brought people from across the country together so I really believe BDO make a large effort to get everybody involved in activities outside of the work environment. There are also a lot of places nearby which is ideal for 'team building'.