Internship at Assurance at EY or Commercial Banking at HSBC?

Hi all,
I've recently gotten two internship offers that run concurrently, and stuck on which one to pick!! Just a quick run-through of them:

Role: I've heard the notorious view that assurance is very very boring, so in this sense commercial banking could trump audit at EY- I'm not 100% sure what both involve yet, but I have heard that commercial banking gives you so much more space to try new things.

Firm: this is what stumps me! EY is one of the Big Four and really prestigious; doing an internship here will look amazing for the CV. Plus if I get a grad job here, then I know it sets me up for my future really well. However, I don't just want to go for the firm and forget the role itself. The last thing that I want to do is if in the event I find out I don't like auditing, I still force myself to stay there because of the security and name. However, with HSBC I'm not sure about how much security it provides. What if I come to dislike commercial banking as well? What if I find out the future prospects of commercial banking is not as good as auditing at EY?

CV: Which one is better for my CV, given that I'm not sure the specific career path within financial services / banking / consulting yet, but definitely something along those lines if you know what I mean! EY is definitely so prestigious, but will commercial banking give me more transferable and flexible skills? Additionally, I do also want to look into more quantitative internships in the near-future such as strategy analyst - would commercial banking not be useful in this regard?

Culture: Both of the atmospheres at the Assessment Centre was very welcoming and friendly, but something just leans me towards liking HSBC better for some reason. This may be because the questions they asked me were more prone to conversation though!

Blacklisted: I want to be able to try different things out without closing potential future doors, and I've heard that once you reject an internship, they blacklist you forever. Which is why I want to put as much thought into this as I can, and this indecisiveness and overthinking is really stressing me out.

Length of time and salary: salary I do not care about at all as this is only an internship, but I can anyone give me some insights on the long-term salary paths of the two roles?
Start date wise, both of the internships actually clash a bit with my end of term which is concerning, so I also want to choose the one that will be the most flexible. The EY internship is 6 weeks and HSBC is 8 weeks.

Please, anyone help with insights? Opinions and insights on literally anything I've mentioned here would be useful! Which one would you pick? Or if you have done one of these internships / an internship at one of these firms, how was it?

Really need advice since I need to make my decision by next week!

I’d go for commercial banking at HSBC personally, seems more interesting and I’d prefer working there . But I’m not the most informed , HSBC has very good reputation id think

Hey- thank you so much for replying! Do you work in banking / financial services or have had experience with it?x

Hi all,
I've recently gotten two internship offers that run concurrently, and stuck on which one to pick!! Just a quick run-through of them:

Role: I've heard the notorious view that assurance is very very boring, so in this sense commercial banking could trump audit at EY- I'm not 100% sure what both involve yet, but I have heard that commercial banking gives you so much more space to try new things.

Firm: this is what stumps me! EY is one of the Big Four and really prestigious; doing an internship here will look amazing for the CV. Plus if I get a grad job here, then I know it sets me up for my future really well. However, I don't just want to go for the firm and forget the role itself. The last thing that I want to do is if in the event I find out I don't like auditing, I still force myself to stay there because of the security and name. However, with HSBC I'm not sure about how much security it provides. What if I come to dislike commercial banking as well? What if I find out the future prospects of commercial banking is not as good as auditing at EY?

CV: Which one is better for my CV, given that I'm not sure the specific career path within financial services / banking / consulting yet, but definitely something along those lines if you know what I mean! EY is definitely so prestigious, but will commercial banking give me more transferable and flexible skills? Additionally, I do also want to look into more quantitative internships in the near-future such as strategy analyst - would commercial banking not be useful in this regard?

Culture: Both of the atmospheres at the Assessment Centre was very welcoming and friendly, but something just leans me towards liking HSBC better for some reason. This may be because the questions they asked me were more prone to conversation though!

Blacklisted: I want to be able to try different things out without closing potential future doors, and I've heard that once you reject an internship, they blacklist you forever. Which is why I want to put as much thought into this as I can, and this indecisiveness and overthinking is really stressing me out.

Length of time and salary: salary I do not care about at all as this is only an internship, but I can anyone give me some insights on the long-term salary paths of the two roles?
Start date wise, both of the internships actually clash a bit with my end of term which is concerning, so I also want to choose the one that will be the most flexible. The EY internship is 6 weeks and HSBC is 8 weeks.

Please, anyone help with insights? Opinions and insights on literally anything I've mentioned here would be useful! Which one would you pick? Or if you have done one of these internships / an internship at one of these firms, how was it?

Really need advice since I need to make my decision by next week!

Take commercial banking - without an internship it is very hard to get into banking however you'll be able to get into assurance at a B4 just fine without. Therefore the commercial banking one leaves open the most doors. If it were a grad role my view here may be different or more balanced but for an internship you've got a choice between a career path where an internship at a bank is pretty much a requirement Vs one where the majority of the graduate intake will not have relevant internship experience.

This is definitely very useful- Thank you! Would you also say that commercial banking gives me the most transferrable skills, able to apply to a range of future potential roles as well- including more technical ones?

This is definitely very useful- Thank you! Would you also say that commercial banking gives me the most transferrable skills, able to apply to a range of future potential roles as well- including more technical ones?

What are you actually going to be doing in Commercial Banking? Who are you shadowing? Front or back office?

Unfortunately I'm not 100% sure what that means, neither did they mention that! It's UK regional rotations - does that mean anything?

Doesn't mean anything I'm afraid. Basically, what you probably need to know is this:

1) It doesn't really matter at this stage of your career which internship you choose. The purpose of the internship is to see what you like doing. No one sensible is going to hold it against you for choosing one over the other or think at 18 or 19 that you made a decision that was going to determine your entire future;

2) There isn't really a huge difference in prestige between EY and HSBC;

3) If you do the EY internship, you will probably spend most of your time doing mundane audit tasks but you will also get the opportunity to see what it's like at a professional services firm;

4) It's less clear what you will do at HSBC. You could end up in the back office and it will be a bit similar to EY in that you will do some mundane administrative tasks but see what it is like in a commercial bank, although this would be the worst outcome for you because back office commercial banking is going to be less beneficial to an early career than audit in a Big 4 firm. However, in contrast, you might do a front office internship seeing client relationships, loan origination etc. That would possibly be the best outcome.

If you don't know what you will be doing at HSBC then the safe option is EY. If you do and its front office, do the HSBC one. But either way, it's not that big a deal, trust me.

Hi all,
I've recently gotten two internship offers that run concurrently, and stuck on which one to pick!! Just a quick run-through of them:

Role: I've heard the notorious view that assurance is very very boring, so in this sense commercial banking could trump audit at EY- I'm not 100% sure what both involve yet, but I have heard that commercial banking gives you so much more space to try new things.

Firm: this is what stumps me! EY is one of the Big Four and really prestigious; doing an internship here will look amazing for the CV. Plus if I get a grad job here, then I know it sets me up for my future really well. However, I don't just want to go for the firm and forget the role itself. The last thing that I want to do is if in the event I find out I don't like auditing, I still force myself to stay there because of the security and name. However, with HSBC I'm not sure about how much security it provides. What if I come to dislike commercial banking as well? What if I find out the future prospects of commercial banking is not as good as auditing at EY?

CV: Which one is better for my CV, given that I'm not sure the specific career path within financial services / banking / consulting yet, but definitely something along those lines if you know what I mean! EY is definitely so prestigious, but will commercial banking give me more transferable and flexible skills? Additionally, I do also want to look into more quantitative internships in the near-future such as strategy analyst - would commercial banking not be useful in this regard?

Culture: Both of the atmospheres at the Assessment Centre was very welcoming and friendly, but something just leans me towards liking HSBC better for some reason. This may be because the questions they asked me were more prone to conversation though!

Blacklisted: I want to be able to try different things out without closing potential future doors, and I've heard that once you reject an internship, they blacklist you forever. Which is why I want to put as much thought into this as I can, and this indecisiveness and overthinking is really stressing me out.

Length of time and salary: salary I do not care about at all as this is only an internship, but I can anyone give me some insights on the long-term salary paths of the two roles?
Start date wise, both of the internships actually clash a bit with my end of term which is concerning, so I also want to choose the one that will be the most flexible. The EY internship is 6 weeks and HSBC is 8 weeks.

Please, anyone help with insights? Opinions and insights on literally anything I've mentioned here would be useful! Which one would you pick? Or if you have done one of these internships / an internship at one of these firms, how was it?

Really need advice since I need to make my decision by next week!

How can I get their acceptation? Im currently looking for an internship for next year placement and applying to Big 4 companies but I wasn't rejected after online assessment. Do u have any advices or practical assessment pack to share?

Thank you so much for the insight! I've actually looked more on their website for the internship, and it says:

"We are continuously looking for new ways to improve our business customer’s experience and we welcome your fresh perspective. You will work within a diverse team to exceed customer expectations and support their business’s growth. To ensure Commercial Banking is equipped for the present and future, we use new technology to help us to interact better with our clients. You will have the opportunity to learn about these technologies, how they benefit our business and how they are used in our product teams.

What you will do
This internship aims to give you an idea of where you could fit within our business. To help you explore your interests and gain confidence in your abilities, you will take a hands-on, customer-facing role, where you can learn about our international capabilities and the 1.3 million business customers our Commercial Bank serves. Whatever degree you are doing, you will be supported to find an area you can succeed in, gaining the skills that are necessary to make your mark."


If I'm not mistaken, this sounds more like Front Office right?

Nevertheless, I do want to get a graduate job out of this, so I feel as though it is still quite important, seeing as I'm in my penultimate year of university already. Let me know what you think!

Yeah, do the HSBC one, it looks more interesting. And if you don't like it, the Big 4 will still be there at the end of the week!