Playbook, salon or spa
Unhappy with the result, and the reply that does not adjudicate
This complaint arrives with the client looking in a mirror at the thing they are complaining about. It is on their body, they will be seen in it tomorrow, and it does not go away while somebody investigates. That is a different emotional starting point from a late delivery, and an assistant that opens with a policy paragraph has already lost the client.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for complaints holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- The subject of the complaint is attached to the person, so there is no cooling off period and no putting it aside until Monday, which makes speed of handover matter more here than accuracy of first reply.
- Most salons hold a redo position rather than a refund position: come back inside a set number of days and it will be put right, and that is a materially different offer that has to be described as an offer rather than as a refusal.
- Asking the client to come back to the same stylist sounds wrong to them and is right for the salon, because the person who mixed the colour knows what is on the hair and starting again with somebody else usually lengthens the work.
- Colour genuinely moves after the client leaves, since a toner softens over the first few washes, so a complaint on day one and a complaint on day ten are about different things and the redo window exists precisely to draw that line.
How it arrives
- im not happy with my colour what can i do
- the toner has washed out after two washes
- can someone else fix it not the person who did it
- my highlights are more orange than i wanted
- do i get my money back if i hate my cut
- who do i speak to about my treatment yesterday
What has to be indexed for this to work
| The redo position, with the window stated in days | How long a client has to come back, that it is put right rather than refunded, and whether it is with the original stylist. Written as what the salon will do, not as what it will not do, because the wording decides how this reads at the worst possible moment. |
|---|---|
| Who a complaint reaches and how fast | The manager or owner by role, the address it goes to, and the time within which somebody responds. Publish a time you can actually meet on a Saturday afternoon, not one that only works midweek. |
| What the salon needs to see | Photographs in natural light, when the appointment was, and what has been used on the hair since. Asking for this in the first exchange means the manager rings back informed rather than ringing back to ask questions. |
| How colour behaves in the first fortnight | A plain paragraph on toner softening, home shampoo and water. This is not an excuse, it is the context that makes the redo window make sense, and clients who read it beforehand complain less and later. |
The reply
I am sorry, and I would rather the manager heard this from you directly than have me try to sort it here. Where a colour has not come out as agreed, the salon asks people to come back inside the window on our page and the stylist puts it right, and there is no charge for that [1]. It helps if you can send a couple of photographs in natural light and say when the appointment was. Leave me your name and an email with those and the manager will call you.
It apologises once, briefly, without conceding anything about the work, because the client needs acknowledgement before information. The redo is stated as something the salon does rather than as a policy the client is subject to. And it asks for the two things that make the callback productive instead of asking what went wrong, which is a question only a person should be asking.
Where it stops
The trigger. Any message expressing unhappiness with a result, a treatment or a member of staff, however mildly it is phrased.
This needs the manager rather than me, and I will not try to work out what happened from here. Leave me your name, an email, when you were in and a photograph if you have one, and somebody will call you today if the salon is open.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never agree that the work was done badly, because the assistant did not see it and the admission stands whatever the stylist says afterwards.
- Never promise a refund, a free service or a redo in a particular case, since the salon decides that after looking.
- Never explain the result away as normal fading or as the client's aftercare, which reads as a defence before anybody has listened.
- Never name or discuss the stylist who did the work, whatever the client says about them.
Questions
- Should it quote the redo window at all, or just take details?
- Quote it. The client is frightened this cannot be fixed, and knowing there is a route and a timescale is the thing that stops a bad evening becoming a review. What it must not do is apply that policy to their case, which is the manager's call.
- Can it tell the client to come in tomorrow?
- No. It cannot see the diary, and a redo needs the right stylist and enough time, which is exactly the sort of slot that is not free at short notice. It should say the manager will arrange it and take the details needed to do that.
- What if the complaint is about a burn or a reaction rather than a result?
- That leaves this pair entirely. Anything describing pain, a burn or a scalp reacting gets the phone number and a line about seeking medical advice, immediately, with no policy wording and no aftercare tips in front of it.
Keep reading
- Everything for a salon or spaPrices depend on hair length and condition, so a real quote needs a consultation. Patch tests and pregnancy questions need a person.
- Handling complaints in generalThe job is to route, not to resolve. Acknowledge without conceding, name the escalation route, and get it to a person fast.
- The questions nobody rings a salon to askWash your hair or not, what a first colour consultation covers, and what a robe and a locker actually mean at a spa.
- The morning that starts at six and has to finish by elevenA group takes the floor and the morning runs backwards from a ceremony time, so it is staffing and a trial before it is a booking.
- The stairs, the basin and the height of the couchStairs to a first floor, whether the basin can be used without lying back, and a quieter hour for a client who needs one.
Try it on your own material
Upload a document or point it at your site, paste one line of HTML, then ask it something only your business could answer.