Mumsnet Talk

Wow, I'm shocked by all these prices. I take my 2 yr old dd and myself for a dry cut. It's £15 for me and they don't normally charge for dd. I must be very lucky.

I paid because I hate confrontation! I told them I thought it was ridiculous, and they just looked at me blankly and apologised saying that's just how much it is. They were clearly uncomfortable too, but when they didn't offer any compromise I figured it would be a case of calling the manager and I would have been embarrassed to cause a scene.

Am I allowed to name and shame or do I get in trouble?!

How much! Blimey! I pay £15 for mine to be trimmed and DS2s to be styled. Mind you, the girl that does it is the fork I used to babysit, so I suspect I don't pay full whack

was this in the UK? Never heard of it before. Always get charged a fixed price which for us is £6 for a childs haircut

I'd have caused a bloody scene for that much!! But quietly and firmly doing the broken record technique of repeating and repeating your grievance till they back down works the best, I've found.

And definitely asked to see the manager to make sure they weren't putting a tenner in the till and pocketing the rest (my friend who owns a salon was ripped off by 2 of her trusted girls for a few weeks like this before a customer dobbed them in to her)

You see it completely depends where the salon is, if it's in Covent Garden then YABU if it's in a tiny salon in the back of beyond then YANBU imo.

That is a total and absolute rip-off by anybody's standards. No way could they justify charging that for cutting a two year old's hair. They should have their prices displayed by law. If you feel really annoyed you should phone up your Local Trading Standards office.

And anyway, if its not your local place, and you never have to go back there and risk your own barnet with them, why not lie down on the floor and drum your heels? It's not like you ever have to see them again!!
Love a bit of confrontation, me, and I haggle everywhere too!!

Hooow muuuch???

Jeez bigeez. That's a total rip off.

Hmmm. There is a salon near me where that is what a child's cut would cost and adult will not leave with a bill less than £50.

Um, £50 would be cheap where I live. A child's cut costs £29 in my hairdressers. Obviously I don't pay that. I cut DD's hair myself.

I would be furious. That's ridiculous.

That is so expensive. My ds had his hair cut at a really trendy salon yesterday for £9. That was a wash, cut and blow dry.

Toni and guy only charge £5 for under fives!

I pay £36 for a cut and blow dry, live no where near London and according to a recent MN thread about how much people pay I think the people on this thread are paying well under the usual rate tbh.

Well yeah Valium, I pay £38 for my hair to be cut but there's no way in earth a child's hair should be £23.

I have never taken my DS's to the hairdressers. I bought professional clippers. Had a few lessons thanks to YouTube and saved myself loads of time and money. I bought a proper hairdressers gown for the to wear too

I don't do my DD's but my DS's still prefer me to cut their hair and they are 19 and 20. They look good with shortish hair which makes it much easier to cut and style.

I can't imagine that it's difficult to cut a two year olds hair.

Mrs well the OP's child's hair took half an hour so it was a pretty decent hair cut by the sounds of it - mine takes half an hour to cut and then a blow dry on top - so not much less than an adult haircut.

At those rates, it would have cost me £184, not including colour, for my hair last time I was in - I was there for 4 hours! (it cost me £60).

30mins including rinsing someone else's colour out.
Op does what is your DD's hair like?

It seems odd to actually charge the customer a hourly rate, although obviously most services, including hairdressers do actually base their charges on an hourly rate.

As a hairdresser though, cutting children's hair is a PITA. I have been kicked, had parents want me to cut a screaming, wriggling child's hair, which the rest of the salons client would then obviously have to listen to and it quite often ends up taking the same time as an adults haircut, so I never understand why people always expect to pay less for a child's haircut that takes the same time as an adults? That said, we used to charge half price for under 12's. as a result we mostly hated doing children's hair, not least as we worked on commission.

£23 is ridiculous though, unless that is what they charge for an adult haircut.

I take ds to the local "old ladies" hairdresser who is fab, great with kids and only charges £6 per cut (no offence meant by the term old ladies but you know what I mean). All the young'uns round here go to the "posh" and "trendy" salon but when I enquired about prices for ds's haircut they initially said £15 then when they realised he was a boy said they don't do toddler boys.

It would be interesting to know where this salon is. I pay £90 but it is in London and well known celebrity hairdresser. DS likes to get his hair cut at trendy salon near us. I make him contribute £5 so that he has to think about whether he 'really' wants to use them. He does and pays me at the end (he's 15)

She has fine hair, but it is quite thick, so it does show every cut. It is a bob, just below ears now, had about an inch off. I can't do it myself.

Salon is in a small town just south of Milton Keynes.

Lesson learned, I won't go back ;-)

I would have thought all hairdressing charges are based on how long the job takes, so, in answer to your title, that, in itself is not unreasonable.
However, the amount they are charging seems very high. I certainly don't pay £46 an hour for my hairdresser, and also the amount of time they took seems ridiculously long ~ what 2 yr old will sit still for 1/2 hour ?
However, you should have questioned it when they tried to charge you that - scene or not. Indeed, the bigger the scene the sooner they would have compromised I'd have thought - bad for their business and all that, against the fact clearly you won't be going there again. In truth, you should have asked them before they started cutting, what their hourly rate was if they were charging by time taken, then made it obvious you were looking at your watch, and discounting time when they weren't cutting her hair if they left her in the middle of it.

Sounds like they don't like cutting children's hair. I'd be very cross at that price, that's more than I pay for a cut a blow dry for me.

I would ring and ask for the manager, don't say why, so you don't get fobbed off with he/she is out. Then ask the manager for the price of a basic child's cut.

Seem a ridiculous price to pay.