Lloyds Banking Group

Lloyds Banking Group runs its early-careers hiring across four routes, based in eight UK cities (Birmingham, Bristol, Chester, Edinburgh, Halifax, Leeds, London and Manchester):

• Graduate schemes: more than a dozen named, function-specific streams including Finance, Risk, Actuarial, Corporate Banking and Markets, Data Science and AI, Technology Engineering, Human Resources and Occupational Psychology.
• Undergraduate opportunities: a summer internship plus six industrial placements (Consumer Lending, Data Science and AI, Everyday Banking, Finance, Risk and Technology Engineering).
• Apprenticeships across business and technology areas.

Because each scheme is a separate application tied to one function, the choice of stream is made before you apply rather than after you join. Programmes reopen in the autumn and the Group warns it may close a scheme early once it receives enough strong applications, so the real window for any one stream can be shorter than its published closing date.

First, an online application and a roughly 60-minute online assessment built from audio content, written articles and mock emails with time-recorded questions. Second, a Job Insight Assessment of role scenarios and data to interpret, answered through recorded video and written responses. Third, an assessment centre combining a one-to-one interview, a group exercise and individual assessments, run virtually over Microsoft Teams or in person. Technology and Data schemes follow the same three stages with a longer first-stage assessment (up to 130 minutes for Technology Engineering) and an added technical exercise at the centre. Most of the work therefore sits in self-completed online stages before any live contact, and because each stage is a separate timed sitting, a candidate applying to several schemes is scheduling multiple online assessments in parallel ahead of a single assessment day.

There is no minimum degree classification, though Occupational Psychology requires a BPS-accredited MSc. This is a hard gate rather than a preference: without existing UK work rights a candidate cannot convert a Lloyds offer, so for international students the schemes are realistically open only to those already on a visa that permits UK work, such as post-study work rights. It is worth confirming that status before spending an application here, because the whole process is foreclosed without it.