Dentons offers £10k for deferring trainees

The City firm has offered its September 2009, March 2010, September 2010, March 2011 and September 2011 intake a cash incentive of £7,000 for the 12-month deferral, with an additional £3,000 on offer if they take up pro bono or charitable work during the year.

Dentons emailed future trainees late last week to offer the deferral and is consulting with trainees on a one-on-one basis to answer any queries. The firm takes on an average of 25 trainees in September and ten in March.

Dentons joins a raft of City firms asking trainees to defer their start dates, with Lovells, Baker & McKenzie, Herbert Smith and Norton Rose among other firms to offer a cash incentive.

Trainee partner Jeremy Cape said: "We try at all times to match the needs of our trainees to the needs of our business. The business needs of six months ago are not the same as our business needs now. We are trying to provide more opportunities in the future for trainees, which is essentially the same reason that everyone is deferring training contracts."

The news comes just one month after the firm finalised its redundancy consultation which saw 76 staff members laid off, including 37 fee earners, across the firm's offices in London and Milton Keynes.