Thanks to the Rugby World Cup, I now have a fulltime job

Auckland hotel porter Jared Hack credits the Rugby World Cup with helping him land his first fulltime job since leaving school.

Mr Hack, 18, is one of 20 people hired straight off the dole queue among the first 100 employees at the new 263-bed Novotel Auckland Airport Hotel, owned jointly by Tainui and the airport, which opened in May near the international terminal.

A further two people were also hired off the dole queue for a smaller 125-room Formule 1 hotel, also owned by the airport, which opened nearby on August 29.

Eighty people in all have been hired from Work and Income's rolls since the start of last year under a partnership with the French-owned Accor group, which manages the two airport hotels and 24 others around the country.

Work and Income pays Accor to employ two people to train the recruits.

Mr Hack, who finished Year 13 at Kelston Boys High School last year, had worked at Pak'nSave in Mt Albert for about 12 hours a week until he landed the Novotel job in July. He admits he was bored.

"I enjoy coming in. It's better than sitting around home," he said.

He started with three weeks of training at Accor's Novotel Ellerslie hotel, then plunged straight into work as a porter on August 14.

"It's cool," he said. "You greet people, you help when they need to know somewhere to go or somewhere to eat in the area, or if they call up for extra things like towels, or to park their cars."

He is guaranteed 30 hours a week but is working 40 hours because the hotel is busy with the Rugby World Cup.

Front office manager Mathieu Le Besq said the hotel would normally have built up slowly to full staffing, but had to ramp up quickly because of the cup.

"But once the Rugby World Cup is over there will still be a role for Jared.

"His role within the hotel is permanent," Mr Le Besq said.

Accor is now recruiting for its next training intake in Wellington next month.

Its next Auckland intake will be recruited in November ready to start work in February.

Social Development Minister Paula Bennett said this month that Work and Income had 380 vacancies for World Cup roles, mostly in hospitality and security roles.

The cup has helped to keep numbers on the unemployment benefit dropping in six of the past seven months, despite the Christchurch earthquakes and what was revealed last week to have been a flat economy in the three months to June.

There were 55,974 people on the dole at the end of August, down 12.4 per cent from 63,910 at the same time last year.