Paid Trial Shifts for Chefs: US, UK and Australia Rules

A trial shift (a "stage", or 体験入店 in Japan) is the most reliable way to see whether a cook can actually work your station. It is also where restaurants most often get into trouble with wage law. This guide sets out what we could confirm from official sources in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia, and how to design a trial that tests the right things for a Japanese kitchen.

1. The short answer: pay for it

In all three countries covered here, the official position turns on the same idea: if the person is doing productive work for your business, rather than being assessed on skills, the law is likely to treat it as work that must be paid. The safe and simple policy is:

If you still want an unpaid assessment, the rules below show how narrow it has to be.

2. United States

The federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) defines "employ" to include "to suffer or permit to work" (29 U.S.C. § 203(g)). The Department of Labor's regulation on hours worked states that "work not requested but suffered or permitted is work time" (29 CFR 785.11). And in its fact sheet on internships, the Department states plainly that "the FLSA requires 'for-profit' employers to pay employees for their work."

The fact sheet sets out a "primary beneficiary" test for unpaid internships, and its factors are tied to formal education: academic credit, the academic calendar, training similar to an educational setting. A cook doing a trial shift in a commercial kitchen does not fit that model. We found no federal rule that creates a separate category of lawful unpaid "trial shift".

Two practical consequences:

• Treat the trial as a short paid job. Pay at least the applicable minimum wage (state and city minimums are often higher than federal), and follow your normal payroll process.
• Complete Form I-9. Under 8 CFR 274a.2, where an employer hires someone for less than three business days, both the employee section and the employer's document check must be completed at the time of hire, not within the usual three business days.

States can add their own rules. Check your state labor department before setting a trial policy.

3. United Kingdom

The Department for Business and Trade's guidance on calculating the minimum wage (updated 6 January 2026) has a section on unpaid work trial periods. It accepts that an unpaid trial "will often be a legitimate practice", but warns that current law does not define a trial work period, and that someone asked to do a "trial" may still be a worker entitled to the minimum wage.

The guidance lists the factors a court or tribunal is likely to consider:

• whether the trial is genuinely for recruitment;
• whether it lasts longer than the employer reasonably needs to test the person. In the government's view, someone working in a trial longer than one day is likely to be entitled to the minimum wage in all but very exceptional circumstances;
• how closely the person is observed;
• whether the tasks relate to the job offered;
• whether the tasks have value to the employer beyond testing (tasks in a simulated environment normally indicate they do not);
• whether trial periods are used to reduce labour costs.

It adds that an unpaid trial of a few hours "may be reasonable". In a working restaurant kitchen during service, though, what a cook produces is served to paying guests, which is exactly the "value to the employer" the guidance warns about.

If you pay the trial, you are employing the person. GOV.UK states that you must check a job applicant's right to work before you employ them, and that you must tell HMRC about a new employee on or before their first pay day. The National Living Wage is £12.71 an hour from April 2026.

4. Australia

We could not load the Fair Work Ombudsman's own page when researching this article. The Victorian Labour Hire Authority, a state government body, summarises the rules (7 March 2024): unpaid pre-employment assessments are lawful only when they

• "are used to demonstrate a person's skills required for a job",
• "only last as long as really necessary to assess specific competencies required for the job", and
• "involve the person being supervised and assessed".

Anything beyond that is work and must be paid at the applicable award or agreement rate. A cook who works a full dinner service unpaid is well outside these conditions. For the authoritative version, check the Fair Work Ombudsman's pages on unpaid trials, and our Australia hiring guide for award rates.

5. Candidates without work rights

A paid trial is employment, so the candidate must have the right to work in your country before the shift. That rules out a paid trial for a chef who is visiting on a tourist entry or who is still in Japan waiting for a visa.

For those candidates, use a skills test that is clearly not work: a video test from Japan, or a short demonstration in a simulated setting with nothing served to guests. The UK guidance treats a simulated environment as a sign that the tasks have no value to the employer, which is the point. Check your own country's visitor rules before arranging even that. Our guide to remote skills tests sets out a three stage process, and probation reviews cover the paid trial period once the chef has arrived and started work.

6. Designing a trial shift for a Japanese kitchen

Four hours is usually enough to see what you need. A structure that works for a sushi or Japanese hot kitchen:

Before the day, send the candidate in writing:

• the date, start and finish time, and that the trial is paid, at what rate;
• what to bring (own knives or not; our knife and tools policy guide covers this);
• who they will report to;
• when they will hear the outcome.

7. Scoring and deciding

Have the senior cook who worked alongside the candidate score separately from the head chef, then compare. Score 1 to 4 on each line:

• Knife work and technique
• Consistency (the tenth piece looks like the first)
• Hygiene and cleaning as they go
• Speed during service
• Communication with the team
• Response to correction

The last line often decides it. A candidate who adjusts straight away when shown your way of doing something will fit in faster than a more skilled cook who argues.

Give an answer within two or three days. Pay the trial through payroll on time, hired or not. A cook who was paid promptly for a trial they did not get will still speak well of you.

General information, not legal advice. Minimum wage and trial rules can differ by state, territory and city and change over time; check the official sources below and local rules before setting a trial policy.