Can I recover damages from a nail salon who ruined my nail permanently?

[VioletteValentia]

I’ve always work false nails until recently due to somewhere I was studying being against them. I recently went to a wedding and my partner’s mom booked me in to have a full set. I’d never been to the salon before. It was a “Chinese” salon, and I’ve since heard horrible things about these, but hadn’t had any experience before.

I was immediately uncomfortable because I noticed after cutting my skin the instruments weren’t sterilised. I’m a clean freak and that made me feel sick (and I’m now paranoid about all sorts of viruses).

Anyway, the nails looked fine when they were done. A couple of days later, I caught one of them. It lifted my nail off. My actual, natural nail. There was loads of blood and it was incredibly painful, and I’ve had it looked at by an expert who thinks it’ll never grow back because it’s damaged the nail plate. A friend of mine who’s a nail tech said they use a cheap, crap acrylic that isn’t meant for nails, since it’s too strong and ruins them.

I’m really upset by this, I know it’s only a nail and nothing serious but I’ve always enjoyed having my nails done and my one nail is ruined.

Can I do anything legally? I’ve googled and the chemical is banned in the US but not here.

Pics attached.

What kind of expert looked at it to give that opinion?
Do you have pictures of when the nail lifted & all the blood?
What was the chemical and how can you prove that's what they used?
I imagine you could try small claims court and talk to (council) environmental health or trading standards about regulations they should have followed, but it's a long haul.

You'll have to wait months to establish if your nail really won't grow back.

A senior beauty therapist who lectures at a college, told me it probably won’t grow back.

I don’t think I’ve got pictures of the blood, I've got pictures of my hand swelling up and A&E record (I thought I’d broken my hand, it was an accident at the park with my son).

The chemical is MMA. You can tell by the smell of the salon, the technicians wearing masks, nails that won’t remove even after acetone (took two days to remove them) and unlabelled containers.

It’s glued to your natural nail. If it gets caught and rips off- it’s natural that the real nail will also rip off. It’s horribly painful, but not something you can prove is a fault with the salon or technician. If you bent back your tail nail, the same thing could happen. Unless you caught an infection there is nothing the salon has necessarily done wrong.

IMO all false nails are bad for your nails and should never be worn in the long term because they weaken the nail bed.

See www.aol.com/article/2015/10/22/the-hidden-dangers-of-acrylic-nails-and-why-you-might-want-to-re/21252643/ and www.aad.org/public/skin-hair-nails/nail-care/artificial-nails

You really can't go around throwing accusations like that wihtout having any proof.

Go and talk to the company and say what happened, see what they say, but you're going to have to wait until your new nail has grown through to see what it's going to be like.

Did you mention that the instruments weren't sterilised when you were there?

So you had an accident at the park as well? If so and that’s why you visited a&e not sure how that relates to the nail? Could the park accident have caused damage? My dh has a hand injury once and his nail lifted off and has never grown back properly.

I mean not sure how it relates to the nail salon.

Their defence would be it was the park accident which caused the problem.

It’s glued to your natural nail. If it gets caught and rips off- it’s natural that the real nail will also rip off. It’s horribly painful, but not something you can prove is a fault with the salon or technician.

That’s actually not strictly true. If the correct glue is used, the nail is supposed to bend and break itself. It’s to do with the size of molecules apparently, this acrylic hardens and seeps into the nail, making it inflexible and brittle. Acrylic for nails isn’t supposed to do that, for this reason.

You had an accident wearing false nails, it’s what happens unfortunately. You could of had them done in a top salon and that would still of occurred.

But it was the accident that damaged the nail, not the manicure?

Did you mention that the instruments weren't sterilised when you were there?

No. I noticed after they’d been used and very few people at the salon spoke English.

This happened to me with acrylic nails. My nails (about three of them) lifted from the nail bed and were only attached by the cuticles. I then got one caught and it ripped clean off, then it got infected and I had to see doctor and get antibiotics! It's apparently not unusual. I would never have them again. The good news was despite the mess my nails were left in, one completely missing, two which were barely attached, they did grow back. As PP said, it's not an easy process getting compensation and you might find your nail will recover anyway. The photos don't look as the state mine was in!

You could of had them done in a top salon and that would still of occurred.

It shouldn’t, because top salons won’t use MMA, which is what causes nails of steel that rips off your own nail rather than falling off.

I’ve had false nails since my teens and I’ve never had this, ever. If I’ve banged up my hand, the nail usually breaks. It doesn’t rip off.

Sounds like a modern slavery operation nail salon. Shame people support modern slavery by using dodgy salons like this.

You have worn false nails for a long time so your own nails and beds were likely to have been damaged anyway.

Dunno if it's just this salon, here's the Wail saying 8/9 salons tested were using MMA in 2015.

I can't find a campaign website against MMA in the UK, maybe you could start one.

Tainbri that’s good news. How long did it take to grow back?

Sounds like a modern slavery operation nail salon. Shame people support modern slavery by using dodgy salons like this.

It was really strange, DP remarked that it reminded him of a sweatshop. Would never go there again.

I’m confused.
Did they say the nail plate or the nail bed?
If there’s damage to the nail bed, it might not recover.
If you’ve lifted the nail plate from the bed, it should grow back. Might take a few months, but damage to the plate doesn’t mean it’s damaged forever.

Sounds like a modern slavery operation nail salon. Shame people support modern slavery by using dodgy salons like this.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/05/nail-bars-modern-slavery-discount-salons-booming-exploitation

I’m confused.
Did they say the nail plate or the nail bed?
If there’s damage to the nail bed, it might not recover.
If you’ve lifted the nail plate from the bed, it should grow back. Might take a few months, but damage to the plate doesn’t mean it’s damaged forever.

She said I’ve lifted the nail plate and the nail bed looks damaged (it looks rough and cracked).

Quite a few months I'm afraid, it was ripped off completely and literally just bumpy skin left and then it slowly started to grow. Ack from the base. It's fine now, but looked vile for a long time.

Your nail will grow back. I had false acrylic nails put on 30 years ago (I'm old). The technology then was not what it is now,. I had damaged nails. They grew back and I now have really strong natural long nails, it took about a year in total to get them back. If you have been wearing false nails for a long time you really cannot expect no damage to your natural nails.

We’re you the person who visited a&e for a false nail falling off?!! I remember reading about that in the ‘most ridiculous reasons people have visited a&e in 2017’ or something.

*were