Work Experience And Internships: Legal Checklist For NZ Employers

Taking on a student for work experience or offering an internship can be a win-win. You get extra hands (and fresh ideas), and they get real-world exposure to your industry.

But there’s a common trap for small businesses: you might think “it’s just a placement” or “they’re only here for a few weeks”, so the legal side doesn’t really apply.

In New Zealand, the legal line between a genuine learning placement and an employment relationship can get blurry fast. That’s why having a clear legal checklist for work experience and internships can save you a lot of stress (and risk) later.

Note: This article is general information only and doesn’t take into account your specific situation. If you need advice, it’s best to get legal help tailored to your placement and workplace.

Below, we’ll walk through the main legal questions you should ask before someone starts, what documents you’ll want in place, and how to run placements in a way that protects your business from day one.

Why You Need A Legal Checklist (Even For “Short-Term” Placements)

From a business owner’s perspective, internships and work experience often start informally:

• a local school asks if you can host a student for a week
• a university student emails asking to intern to build their portfolio
• a friend-of-a-friend wants exposure to your industry

Because it feels informal, many businesses skip the “paperwork” and go straight to “come in on Monday”. The issue is that legal risk doesn’t care whether something is informal.

Getting the legal foundations right upfront helps you:

• avoid wage claims (e.g. if the person is legally an employee)
• manage health and safety duties (especially for younger workers or higher-risk sites)
• protect confidential information (clients, pricing, systems, passwords)
• set expectations about hours, supervision, training and appropriate tasks
• reduce misunderstandings about future employment (“I thought this internship guaranteed me a role”)

Put simply: a solid checklist is about setting your placement up properly, not creating red tape.

Step 1: Is Your Intern Actually An “Employee” Under NZ Law?

This is the biggest question, and it’s where many businesses accidentally get it wrong.

In New Zealand, calling someone an “intern” doesn’t automatically mean they’re not an employee. The law looks at the real nature of the relationship, not the label you use.

If the placement looks and feels like employment, then you may have to treat them like an employee (including paying at least minimum wage and meeting other employment obligations).

The Practical Test: What Are They Doing Day To Day?

A good starting point is to ask:

• Are they mainly there to learn and observe, or to produce work for your business?
• Are they doing tasks that would otherwise be done by a paid staff member?
• Are you measuring performance like you would with staff (KPIs, targets, sales quotas)?
• Are they working set hours under your direction, like rostered shifts?

Generally speaking, the more the intern is integrated into your business as “labour” (even junior labour), the higher the risk they’ll be considered an employee.

Unpaid Internships: Where Businesses Get Exposed

Unpaid placements can be lawful in some circumstances, but they’re not a “default option”. If the intern is effectively working for your benefit, an unpaid arrangement can create real risk.

If there’s an employment relationship, then laws like the Minimum Wage Act 1983, Employment Relations Act 2000 and Holidays Act 2003 can apply.

That means, depending on the situation, you could be exposed to claims for things like:

• unpaid wages (including arrears)
• holiday pay and other leave entitlements (where applicable)
• penalties for non-compliance

Unpaid arrangements are usually lower risk where the purpose is genuinely educational and the intern is primarily learning or observing (for example, a short placement organised through a school or tertiary provider with clear learning objectives and close supervision). If you’re unsure, it’s usually safer to either (1) pay them, or (2) structure the placement clearly as a limited learning experience with tight boundaries on duties, hours and outputs.

What About School Work Experience?

Many school placements are short, heavily supervised, and primarily observational (for example, a year 10 student spending a few days seeing how your workplace operates). These are often lower risk because the purpose is clearly educational.

Even then, you still have legal duties around safety and appropriate conduct, and you should still document the arrangement so everyone is on the same page.

Step 2: Set The Placement Up In Writing (And Keep It Simple)

If you do one thing from this checklist, make it this: get the arrangement in writing before day one.

A written document helps prevent two common problems:

• Expectation mismatch (the intern thinks they’re being trialled for a job; you think it’s purely learning-based)
• Role creep (a “shadowing placement” slowly turns into 25 hours/week of productive work)

Use The Right Document For The Right Arrangement

Depending on what you’re offering, you might use:

• a Work Experience Agreement (often ideal for short placements focused on learning/observation)
• an Internship Agreement (useful where there’s a structured internship program with defined duties, learning objectives, and duration)
• an Employment Contract (where the person is actually working as an employee, even if it’s fixed-term or part-time)

The key is that the document should match reality. A contract that says “unpaid observational internship” won’t protect you if the person is actually doing paid-employee work in practice.

Clauses You’ll Usually Want To Cover

Even a simple agreement should usually deal with:

• Duration: start date, end date, and whether it can be extended
• Hours and attendance: set days/hours, or “as agreed”, and who to notify if they’re absent
• Supervision: who they report to day-to-day
• Scope of tasks: what they can do, and what they must not do
• Confidentiality: client details, pricing, internal systems, business methods
• Health and safety: induction, training requirements, PPE, site rules
• Expenses: whether you reimburse travel, meals, uniforms, etc.
• Termination: how either party can end the placement (especially important if something isn’t working)

If the placement is arranged through a school, training provider or tertiary institution, you may also be asked to sign their paperwork. That’s normal - but you should still read it carefully and make sure it aligns with your business process and insurance.

Step 3: Health And Safety Obligations (You Can’t “Opt Out”)

Even if your intern isn’t an employee, you still have health and safety duties.

Under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015, businesses (as a PCBU) must take reasonably practicable steps to ensure the health and safety of workers and others affected by the work. Depending on the circumstances, interns and work experience students may be treated as “workers” for health and safety purposes.

Practically, that means you should treat them as if they’re part of your team when it comes to safety.

What “Good” Looks Like For Small Businesses

Before day one, have a basic plan:

• Who is responsible for supervision (one person, not “everyone”)?
• What tasks are suitable for their skill level?
• What areas of the workplace are off-limits (machinery, cash handling, client homes, hazardous substances)?
• Do they need PPE, training, or close supervision?

On day one, do an induction. Keep it practical and documented.

• walk them through site hazards
• show them emergency exits and first aid procedures
• explain incident reporting (“tell us immediately if anything happens”)
• go through any customer-facing or public-facing safety expectations

If your workplace is higher risk (construction, manufacturing, logistics, food production, working at heights, etc.), tighten the controls further. A placement is never worth an accident.

It can also help to understand your broader duty of care approach, because interns and students often need closer supervision than experienced staff.

Step 4: Employment Compliance (If They’re Paid Or Considered An Employee)

If your intern is paid, or there’s a real risk they could be considered an employee, you’ll want to make sure your employment basics are covered.

Minimum Wage, Leave And Record-Keeping

If the arrangement is employment, your obligations can include:

• paying at least minimum wage
• meeting pay cycle and payslip requirements
• keeping wage and time records
• working out leave entitlements under the Holidays Act 2003

Even for short periods, it’s important not to “wing it” with pay. If you’re unsure whether to treat the arrangement as employment, it’s often safer to structure it as employment and document it properly.

Be Careful With Trial-Like Arrangements

Some businesses try to treat an “internship” as a trial to see if the person is a good fit. That’s not automatically unlawful, but it can get messy if you haven’t been clear on:

• whether they’re being paid
• what the role is
• whether a job is actually on the table
• how long the arrangement will run

If you’re genuinely testing someone for a role, it may be more appropriate to hire them properly and use a compliant employment arrangement from day one.

Recruitment Processes Still Need To Be Lawful

If your placement involves an interview or application process (even informal), be mindful of what you ask. Certain topics can create discrimination risk under the Human Rights Act 1993.

A quick sense-check against common illegal interview questions can help you keep things fair and consistent.

Step 5: Privacy, Confidentiality And IP (Protect Your Business Information)

Interns often get exposure to parts of your business that are hard to “unsee”: client lists, sales pipelines, pricing structures, marketing plans, internal templates, and sometimes login access to systems.

That’s why confidentiality and privacy should be on every employer’s checklist.

Privacy Act 2020: Don’t Forget The Basics

If the intern will have access to personal information about customers, clients, or even your staff, you need to think about your privacy compliance.

This isn’t just about having a document on your website - it’s about how you handle information day-to-day, including access controls and training.

Depending on your business, it may be appropriate to have (and follow) a Privacy Policy and ensure the intern understands:

• what information is confidential
• what they can and can’t share
• how to store information securely
• what to do if they accidentally send something to the wrong person

Confidentiality: Make It Specific

A “don’t share secrets” instruction is rarely enough. Your agreement should ideally spell out what confidentiality means in your context, for example:

• no copying templates or internal resources
• no taking screenshots of customer systems
• no posting workplace content online without approval
• returning all work product and materials at the end

Who Owns What They Create?

If your intern creates anything during the placement (designs, code, written content, photos, customer resources, processes), you should be clear about ownership.

In many businesses, interns are brought in specifically to help with content or projects. If that’s your plan, it’s worth getting legal clarity on whether the business owns the IP created during the internship, and what the intern can include in their portfolio.

This is another reason why a well-drafted internship or work experience agreement is so valuable: it reduces misunderstandings later.

Volunteers Vs Interns: Don’t Mix The Categories

Sometimes a person will offer to “volunteer” to gain experience. If the arrangement is truly volunteering for a charitable or community purpose, a Volunteer Agreement can help set expectations.

But if the arrangement is really about providing labour to a for-profit business, calling it “volunteering” won’t necessarily reduce your risk. If they’re doing work for your business under your direction, you still need to consider whether they’re actually an employee.

Key Takeaways

• Having a clear legal checklist helps you set expectations, reduce disputes, and protect your business from day one.
• Calling someone an “intern” doesn’t automatically mean they can be unpaid - if the relationship looks like employment, you may need to comply with the Employment Relations Act 2000, Minimum Wage Act 1983 and Holidays Act 2003.
• Document the arrangement before the placement starts using the right agreement, such as a Work Experience Agreement or Internship Agreement, and make sure the terms match what will actually happen in practice.
• Your health and safety obligations apply even for short placements, especially where the intern is young, inexperienced, or entering a higher-risk worksite.
• Protect confidential business information by limiting system access, training interns on privacy expectations, and ensuring your confidentiality and privacy settings are clear.
• If you’re unsure whether a placement should be paid or treated as employment, it’s worth getting tailored legal advice early - it’s much easier to structure it properly upfront than fix it later.

If you’d like help setting up a work experience or internship arrangement (or figuring out whether your intern should be treated as an employee), you can reach us at 0800 002 184 or team@sprintlaw.co.nz for a free, no-obligations chat.