Assurance Intern Review

I gained a lot of experience in the field of assurance, both through training and on-the-job coaching. This led to an enjoyable internship as I was able to understand the work in much more depth than I otherwise would have done. Despite coming from a non-financial degree, I still found the work interesting and engaging.

Even without industry experience, I felt that my colleagues appreciated my being there and were more than happy to assist me where necessary. This meant that I felt like part of the team and got to know my colleagues well.

Management were exceedingly helpful in assisting me where necessary. Having not had any audit experience in the past, I was in at the deep end, but I didn't meet a single member of staff that was unwilling to help me out.

For the first 4 weeks of the internship I had a solid stream of work that meant I was almost always occupied, but there was no expectation that I completed more than was reasonably expected of an intern. The internship is unfortunately timed to coincide with an unbusy period for PwC, so the time I spent actually working at the office was quite sparse.

The work I undertook during my placement was on actual PwC clients, which meant I carried a certain level of responsibility. This made the work more engaging and gave a better impression of what a career at PwC would actually be like.

PwC has given me experience in an office environment that I was yet to have seen. It has definitely boosted my interpersonal skills, which will be of use in all walks of life, and the improvements in my time planning will help me in completing my final year of university.

At client sites, the atmosphere was a focused one, with people mainly centring their attention on their work. Back at the office, there was a more relaxed atmosphere, although this was probably due to it being a quiet time of year. Regardless of location, people were friendly and accommodating, which improved the atmosphere greatly.

I would say that overall the internship was set up well, but that there were points where it definitely could be improved. At client sites, there was rarely a time when I was left with no work, but there was also no "safety net" of work to complete - if there was nothing to do, then there was little to occupy my time. At the office for my last couple of weeks, I had very little work, which made me feel like I wasn't gaining as much as I could be. I appreciate, however, that it was not a busy time for the firm, so this may have been unavoidable.

The internship started with a week of training (3 days residential at a hotel in Windsor, 2 days at the office). I felt like this training was not nearly as effective as the on-the-job learning, but it did provide a good base of knowledge, and showed that PwC are invested in properly training their employees.

PwC seem likely to offer grad jobs to most people on the internship. It's a company that I would definitely be interested in working for, as they provide the opportunity to carry out work on many clients around the country, the opportunity to visit other countries, and a good salary, along with an excellent working environment.

I did not personally see much of the other interns, as I spent most of my time away from them on client sites. When I was in the office for 2 weeks at the end, I built up a good rapport with the other members of my social group.

I was fortunate to get a placement at an office near my student house in Birmingham, so it is hard for me to judge how living costs compare to the rest of the country. I've been surviving on an annual income of less than half of what I expect PwC to pay, so on that front I think the cost of living is reasonable. Cost of socialising seems to be on par with other UK cities.

Although I didn't go on nights out whilst on the internship, I have experienced the nightlife as a student. Birmingham has lots of clubs for many different tastes, so everyone should be happy with the offering.

The impression I got was that there are quite a lot of socials, both office wide and social group specific, but unfortunately my time at PwC did not overlap with any of these. There were a couple of in-office events, such as PwC paying for breakfast to have at the office etc.