Some UK fashion companies are exploiting unpaid interns who sometimes work 12 hours or more a day for months on end with little prospect of a paid job afterwards. Fashion interns say they often outnumber paid staff and claim some companies rely heavily on free labour.

A few months after completing a postgraduate degree in fashion, 25-year-old Rufus Cassidy* took up an unpaid internship with top fashion house Alexander McQueen.

"Most days I worked from 8.30 in the morning until at least 2am," he says. "We usually worked seven days a week and some of the interns got really tired because of the hours."

Cassidy also claims the company relied on interns to carry out core work. "In the pattern making department there were 10 interns and only five paid staff. In embroidery there was just one designer and 10 interns."

In May last year, after eight months of unpaid work, he quit. "I left because it was obvious there was virtually no chance of getting a job there," he says. "They would have been happy for me to continue, but I just couldn't afford to go on working for nothing. I had already done five unpaid fashion internships elsewhere."

Employment law expert Timothy Brennan QC says companies who use interns in the way described by Cassidy could be breaking national minimum wage rules.

"The most important thing as far as the minimum wage is concerned is what the real arrangement is, not whether someone is called an intern or not," Brennan says. "If someone is engaged on a regular basis for an extended period of time to sew sequins on to ball gowns or similar work, which is a core part of a clothing manufacturer's operation, then that person may well be considered an employee or worker and would be entitled to the minimum wage."

Interns at Alexander McQueen are asked to sign an agreement which includes an opt-out from working time regulations which limit the working week to 48 hours. The agreement states that this opt-out can be withdrawn by the intern at any time, on giving three months' written notice. It also says interns "must obey all reasonable instructions that we give you and work such hours as are necessary to properly complete the tasks you are asked to undertake".

Brennan says this agreement suggests the company's interns are, in fact, "workers", and therefore due the minimum wage.

"In the absence of any other material, I would be fairly confident of persuading an employment tribunal that someone who actually worked under a contract on these terms was a worker," he says. "You don't need to contract out of the working time regulations if you are not a worker. If you are within working time regulations because you are a worker, you are within the national minimum wage as a worker."

In a statement, Alexander McQueen told Guardian Work it was confident that it treats its interns in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations. They said that "Alexander McQueen has had immensely positive feedback from its great many interns. Assuming that you have spoken to two or three interns, that represents a tiny minority of those who have passed through AMQ's scheme. The critical issues that your sources have raised are completely out of line with the overwhelming majority of interns."

The hours Cassidy was expected to work by the company may also breach other provisions of the working time regulations.

"In my view, the long hours you describe break working time regulations which say there must be at least 11 hours' rest within any 24-hour period and that every adult worker must have a break of not less that 24 hours in each seven-day period," says David McBride, an employment lawyer with Thompsons Solicitors.

Alexander McQueen's lawyers told Work: "The fashion industry is by no means unique in requiring on occasions those who work in it to undertake long hours." Prospective interns, they added, were "fully informed about the nature of the work they are asked to do," and any intern was "well aware of the purpose of the internship and that there was no guarantee of a job at the end of it". Those who participated gained "invaluable experience", and enhanced their CVs and career prospects.

They also said interns were involved as closely as possible with both the culture, the working practices and the highly skilled activities of the company, that they were closely supervised and were provided with work which was "not only suitable to them, but which also will provide them with the best opportunities to learn".

Periods of intense activity were periodic only, they insisted, such as in the run-up to collections. "The working hours of interns in the run-up to shows where our client is exhibiting collections must be seen in the context of the fact that all of our client's staff work long hours on these occasions – which is normal in the fashion industry," the statement said. When such hours were required, they added, interns were provided with food and taxis home and offered days off to compensate.

Alexander McQueen also denied that interns were expected to carry out core work. They described the claim that interns formed a large part of the workforce in the pattern-making and embroidery departments as "untrue and incredible" and pointed out that such assertions "betrayed a complete ignorance of Alexander McQueen's employee structure", which includes a substantial design team in London supplemented by several freelance technicians and about 60 employees in Italy, and a number of subcontractors who undertake creative and production tasks.

Alexander McQueen is not alone in the fashion world in attracting criticism. Former interns and staff at a number of other fashion companies claim that long hours and excessive expectations can place intense pressure on young staff.

"The designer was constantly shouting at students as young as 19, saying, 'You're fucking useless, you don't know what you're doing,' whenever they didn't do something properly," says a former manager at a small but well-known fashion house which relies heavily on interns. "These girls would be working from 8am to 1am in the run-up to fashion week and some would start crying and getting hysterical because they were being expected to do a job perfectly which they'd never done before."

Impossible expectations

For some, it gets too much. "I have seen people quit because it's such a stressed atmosphere," says a former intern with a larger fashion company. "If you haven't been able to finish something on time, they keep pushing you saying, 'The designer wants it now,' even when you say it's impossible."

Former interns Work has spoken to at another company claim they were exposed to harmful chemicals. "We had to use a toxic liquid to artificially rust metal," one says. "I got nosebleeds after using it and other students did too. At first we used this chemical in a normal room with no special ventilation, but after a week, when everyone had been getting nose bleeds, they told us to work outside on the balcony even though it was freezing cold."

A former fashion student who was an intern with the same company, but at a different time, adds: "The liquid we had to use to age metal caused us to get skin infections. One girl was affected so badly she had to go to hospital and take time off."

Dr Emanuele Lugli, a lecturer at the Istituto Marangoni fashion and design school, says young people put up with these conditions because internships have become essential for anyone who wants a career in the industry.

"Students are constantly telling me how companies are staffing entire departments with interns who work incredibly long hours and are put under enormous pressure," he says. "But they still want to do internships at these places because they are desperate for the experience and to work for these big-name brands."

However, designer Anna Heinrup, a successful fashion consultant, points out that interns can play an important and mutually beneficial role in helping fledgling designers off the ground.

"Some start-ups depend on interns to survive," she explains. "And when I was an intern I had better experiences in small companies because I felt I had more responsibility and could make a real difference."

But not all her experiences were positive. "I worked for one designer for three months where the interns did everything and she didn't even know our names," she says. "There were 10 interns and just three staff and we had to work from 9.30am until up to 10pm in a freezing cold building. The designer didn't care if we were looked after or not because there were lots of young people willing to go there."

While some fashion interns find themselves under intense pressure, others report being required to carry out mundane tasks for weeks on end, giving them little experience of value.

"I was left alone all day in a small fashion cupboard with no windows and no chair, and the only thing I had to do was send samples back to PRs and tidy up the cupboard," says a former intern with a leading women's fashion magazine. "There was nothing creative on offer at all."

Not all interns have a negative experience, however. "I did some really exciting things like go on a cover shoot and work with well-known models," says a former intern at the London office of an international fashion magazine. "It was really friendly and I enjoyed myself."

Another former fashion student, who spent three months working unpaid as a marketing assistant with a well-known UK fashion house, says the internship was organised around her needs, not the other way round.

"I saw all sides of the business," she says, "so I got a real insight into how the industry works, helping me decide what I wanted to do."

Alex Try of Interns Anonymous, an online forum for interns, argues that the increasing popularity of unpaid internships may actually be making it more difficult for new graduates to get employment.

"Posts that were previously offered to new graduates are now being staffed by unpaid interns," he says, "so entry-level jobs are disappearing. Why would a company fork out £15,000 to £20,000 a year for an entry-level fashion designer, when they have an endless supply of people willing to do it for free?"

There have, however, been successful challenges to employers who take advantage of interns. Work reader Michelle Jackson was paid £1,000 for work she had done during a six-week internship with an advertising agency after her tax office told her she might be entitled to the minimum wage.

"They put me in touch with the National Minimum Wage Helpline who investigated the agency and found they had a history of using unpaid placements as free labour," she says. "They were ordered to pay me for the work I'd done as well as any other students they had employed and not paid."

Last November, an employment tribunal ordered London Dream Motion Pictures to make backdated minimum wage payments to Nicola Vetta, an art department assistant who had been taken on by the company on an expenses-only basis.

Martin Spence, assistant general secretary of Bectu, the union that supported Vetta's case, was optimistic that the ruling would set a precedent. "We hope this judgment will draw a line in the sand and we will see more employers complying with the law," he said.

Others, however, think a more fundamental change is needed, such as setting a limit on how long someone is allowed to work unpaid.

"Three months would be an appropriate limit for the length of internships, because an organisation should know by then whether they want to give someone a job or not," says Stephen Overell, associate director of The Work Foundation. "Internships should be about giving people an insight into the sector they are interested in working in, but they should not flip over into working for free."

*Name has been changed

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