Traineeships still make good business sense.

Traineeships can be a great way to hire a much much needed office staff member to enhance your efficiency. The good news is there are government grants available to assist with the cost. In fact, they cover most of the costs!

A few of my clients have taken advantage of this and have received enough funding to cover most of the costs of hiring the new staff member. Now of course, $24K in government payments has strings attached. But as long as you get your head around the terms and conditions, you can essentially have a free employee.

I know. FREE.

Yep - you heard me right.

Here is what I found:

$20K from Queensland government.

• This is the Back to Work Youth Boost.
• For new employees, who have been out of work for 4 weeks or more.
• Click for more info.

$4K from Australian government.

• This is an incentive for a traineeship.
• The traineeship I like is Certificate III in Business Administration. Of course, there are other options.
• Great way to bring in a new person and train them up.
• 12 month nominal contract (under traineeship system), so you can offer them another position after the traineeship, but you don't have to.
• You need to find a flexible training provider in your area to assist with training your new staff member.
• Click to learn more.

Key watch outs.

• Of course there are plenty of terms and conditions. Make sure you read them all and play within the rules.
• The timing of the 12 month nominal contract (full time) needs to be carefully coordinated with the 12 months for the Back to Work Youth Boost.
• The person needs to have no other qualifications. 
• Some young people may have started a traineeship in a call centre and didn't even know, this will make them ineligible.
• Not all trainees and apprentices are eligible. Get in touch with the experts to learn if you qualify.
• Traineeships will have some other fees, sometimes called student fees.
• This is not magic, you HAVE to learn the rules for yourself. No government department will pay you if you simply say "But Roxanne said".

More information.

• Back to Work Youth Boost link. These are the $20K people.
• MEGT traineeship incentive link. These are the $4K people.

The kicker.

• If your trainee left year 12 in 2018, and is eligible for the $20K and the $4K, studying a Certificate III traineeship, their wage is $409.60 per week. See the link to the national training wage information here.
• By my calculations, if I add on 9.5% super and allow 1.5% work cover, this person is approximately $23,700 per year.
• What the? Yes I have checked and checked my calculations. But don't take my word for it - investigate it yourself.

The fine print.

• I am sharing this research as I have found it quite amazing.
• I do not work for the Queensland or Australian government or their representatives.
• All information I have shared is freely available on the internet, please do you own research.
• If you make a decision to act on this, DO NOT take my word for it, use my word only as an impetus to get you started. Contact the appropriate agencies and learn the rules that apply to you. Every workplace and employee is different. You may be eligible for more, you may be eligible for less.
• Don't NOT act - this is too good not to check out fully for yourself.

I originally published this article in August 2017. I have updated the information for 2018 in this version.

Since this article was first written, there have been more changes to the program. Please see the most recent article for the up to date information.