We all have our limits, and these hairdressers were at theirs when it came to certain customers. Content has been edited for clarity purposes.
Wash Her Hair Or FAIL
“As a student of cosmetology back in the early seventies, I was on the last leg of my clinical. During this time, we worked with actual clients. The majority of our customers usually were older ladies who could not afford the high cost of regular salons so they would come to the school to get their hair done for a fraction of the price. A lot of them came in once a month so their scalps were pretty scaly due to having tons of hair spray and lacquer applied over and over again until their next visit. We usually could work through the caked-on products with extra washing.
One Saturday afternoon, a couple of ladies came in and our instructor assigned one of them to me to get them washed before the cut. As I started wetting the client’s hair, a few live roaches landed in the shampoo bowl. Needless to say, it totally freaked me out. I excused myself and went to speak to our instructor and let her know what was happening.
And to my surprise, she told me it was not anything contagious so I had to finish washing the woman’s hair. I absolutely refused to touch the woman’s head again and told her she was welcome to finish the job. She threatened me saying that she would fail me if I didn’t complete the assignment. I went to my station, packed up my kit, and walked out the front door. I was less than 30 hours away from taking my state boards to become a licensed professional.”
Saved By The Lice
“The client in my chair was in her late thirties with a condescending attitude from the instant she opened her mouth. She wanted her medium-length locks spiral permed. The first step was to shampoo her hair. Upon returning to my chair, I proceeded to make the first parting to section it off when a subtle movement caught my eye. My heart froze at the sight. Thinking my eyes were playing tricks on me, I poked it gently with the teeth of my comb and watched as it clambered just out of reach from the further offense.
I saw headlice.
State law prohibits performing any services on a client with lice, among other things. For moral support, I called over the assistant manager of the salon who was working on the woman’s mother. Luckily, we four were the only ones there that slow evening.
‘Is this what I think it is?’ I whispered to her discreetly, a major part of me exhaling relief at not having to deal with this rude client for a whole two hours.
‘Um, let me see.’ Obligingly, I handed over my comb. The little bugger did his dance for her too and she agreed without hesitation.
‘Okay, so ma’am. It looks like you’ve got lice. We’re sorry but we can’t do your hair at this time. There’s a drugstore a few stores down where you can get something to help treat it,’ my assistant manager said.
‘What?! Well, can’t you at least dry it?’ She exclaimed.
‘I’m sorry. By law, I’m not allowed to do anything else to your hair. You can keep the towel and towel dry it if you like, but I can’t do anything more. Sorry.’ I told her.
In a huff, she stood up, collected her things, and sat up front in the waiting area watching her mother get her hair trimmed. It made me uneasy having her still in the building. After five minutes of watching me bag up everything I used on her to suffocate any creatures which may have been left behind, she left, no doubt a tad more humbled in the process.
She discussed with her mother where she might have picked them up before her departure and determined it was from the child(ren) she babysat. I never suspected grownups would be susceptible to lice in this day and age, even though this was at least ten years ago, but they don’t discriminate when faced with a banquet.
This was my first experience with lice, and I couldn’t help doing my hereby-jee by dancing and disinfecting everything which came into contact with the woman, perhaps going overboard. Then again, who wants a lice infestation at work? No thank you.”
New Salon Policy
“An ex-client scheduled an appointment but asked if I could perform a certain style during this visit. I agreed I could perform the style should they arrive at the agreed time frame. But they were 45 minutes late arriving at the salon, very hostile and upset about rodents co-existing in their home and their hired exterminator wasn’t helping.
I extended my apologies for their current circumstances so my assistant quickly escorted them to the shampoo area prepping them for the styling area. When they sat in the chair, I informed them I could not perform the agreed style due to the time constraints of running into my next appointment but was willing to assist them with another style option for their event. That’s when the firecrackers went off.
They spoke to me abruptly stating, ‘You should have told me while scheduling that you could not perform the style!’
‘Wait! What?’ I exclaimed.
I firmly asked my assistant to blow dry their hair and ask them to leave. They asked if I wanted to be paid for the service.
I said, ‘No, thank you. Have a great day! Have not seen them since!’
Lesson learned, we have a written salon policy: for every 15-minute delay there is a late fee…within 45 minutes the salon has a right to refuse service!”
“Sue”
“I work at a salon and have been there ever since I got out of beauty school. It’s a very small shop, and all the clients know every detail about your life and vice versa. When I started, I was a petite person weighing about 110 pounds, however when I got pregnant with my son that quickly changed.
Along with all the stress of pregnancy, being pregnant during 2020 when everything was shut down and also not being with the right person, I took my stress out by eating which caused me to gain a significant amount of weight on top of the baby weight. It’s something I’m very insecure about, and I’ve been struggling to get the weight off, but I never expected an interaction like I did when I came back from maternity leave.
Then we have ‘Sue.’ She was a client who was the biggest nightmare to deal with. Every time she came in, she had a 2 L of Diet Coke, two hotdogs, and a shopping bag filled with random knickknacks and left them all over the place. She constantly asked us to heat up her hotdogs so she could eat them while she was being shampooed. We always said no. And to top it off, no matter what service she got, she tipped in nickels and dimes. She also constantly told us about all the people she was currently suing. At the moment, she was suing her trailer park home for having too many cats in it. So you guys get the gist.
So I came back from maternity and saw Sue was in to get her hair washed.
When she came in, I said, ‘Hello,’
The first thing out of her mouth was, ‘Oh my gosh! You really have gotten big.’
I truly didn’t know what to say to that.
I just kind of shook my head and said, ‘Yeah, let’s just get you shampooed.’
During her service, she kept going on and on about how fat I had gotten and kept mentioning how small I used to be. It started to really bother me.
But the comment that really made me upset was when she looked at me and said, ‘You know I think I figured out why I don’t have a big belly and a big neck like yours. I’ve never had children so that must be the reason.’
I started to tear up, finished her service, and went to the back room and cried. And then two weeks later she came back in and I refused to service her, as I did not feel comfortable working with someone who was just going to insult me.
My boss ended up being upset with me for refusing service, but I honestly didn’t see how I was in the wrong here.”