Pensions Assurance Summer Intern Review

I really enjoyed working for EY and taking part in the social aspects of the programme, as well as Lunch & Learn sessions. However, there often wasn't much work for me to do. I valued the insight the internship gave me as it made it clear to me that Assurance is not the service-line for me. EY were very accommodating and gave me the chance to interview for a service-line swap.

My colleagues were very friendly and extremely helpful, going out of their way to make sure that I had the best possible internship experience that I could. They also did a good job of showing me how the work I was doing (when there was work to be done) fitted into the big-picture of the audit and were appreciative of the work I did.

We were assigned buddies and councillors. Buddies were first-year graduates and councillors were more experienced (mine was an assistant manager). My buddy was hugely helpful and would answer whatever small questions I had, without being at all condescending. My counsellor was also very helpful; he handled the offer process and helped present my case to the offer panel. He also guided me through the swap process.

On average I was given work that I could complete in 3 hours to spread across my 7.5 hour day; although, there were a few (4/5) days at client sites where I was working solidly for the whole day. I expressed my concerns to my counsellor and buddy and they understood and agreed with my assessment of the situation. The managers tried to send work my way when they could but there was still a lot of downtime.

When I did have work to do, I was given more responsibility than I thought I would be. Some of my work would have been signed off by the partner on the audit without my manger looking at it first. I was also given some of the more important aspects of the audits to do (think of significant accounts). I think that I was given a good balance, wherein I was given a fair amount of responsibility but had the necessary guidance available when I needed it.

I'm studying a Philosophy degree, so my time in Assurance isn't really relevant to my studies. However, I do think the internship experience has given me a good insight into working for EY. It has also provided me with a good background knowledge of accounting and finance, which should be very useful for my career in the future.

Everyone was very friendly and the general atmosphere was relaxed and collegiate.

The internship was well structured. It opened with an induction weekend in Manchester and closed with a finale event in a 5* hotel. The internship team also arranged Lunch & Learn and training sessions that were very useful.

The induction weekend was very useful for developing networking and interpersonal business skills.

Received an offer in the service-line and office that I interned in and had a swap-request (different service line, different office - London) approved.

The other interns were very social. Made some friends that I'm still in contact with and spent most of my lunch hours with other interns.

I stayed in a friend's university house, so the cost of living was negligible for me.

I went to a bar with the members of my team once, other than that I didn't go out (I came home on the weekends).

Yes, we took part in a corporate social responsibility day during the internship and there were lots of office sports teams.