To make a complaint about a barber

[sam2069]

Went into a barber this afternoon on the way home from work, around 4.30. I have a short mohican and just wanted the sides shaved. Normally go to a unisex salon in town but only wanted a tidy and couldn't be bothered.
I went into the barber and he had no one waiting, just a guy in the chair. I sat down to wait and he asked me what I wanted. I said, "Oh just a trim," and he said "No!" I laughed and said "You're joking?" He was like, "No I'm not." I said "That's sexist." He just stared at me. I laughed and said that I would make sure that told everybody. So here I am, telling everybody.
Now my question is - AIBU if I make a complaint because he has infringed my rights to receive a service based on my gender - that's discrimination right?

Could there be a clause on his lease? There is a barber and hairdressers almost next to each other locally near me, the hair dresser only does female hair and barber only males. It’s part of the hair dressers lease that she won’t cut any men or boys hairs, and likewise for the barber.

But why can't a barber cut a woman's hair if she wanted something which would be a haircut that a man could have ? (which it sounds like she did)

Good grief, there’s a shocking ignorance of discrimination law around here.

Yes, OP, it is discriminatory for the barber to have refused to cut your hair. He would have been within his rights to refuse to provide a haircut to a woman if it were impracticable. (If, for example, you’d asked him to give you a graduated bob) but that wasn’t the case.

Insurance? You can get insurance for hair ?!

For hairdressing and barbering. I'm not sure if you can insure your own hair, although Jennifer Lopez is rumoured to have insured her arse, so I guess it's possible.

The insurance is to cover injury and accidental damage to property not so much hair, although given how litigious people are getting it won't be long until someone tries to sue a salon or a stylist for a bad haircut.

Insurance isn't a legal requirement but it's smart, I mean would you risk dropping peroxide onto someone's new Gucci shirt without it if you were on NMW?

Hairdressing and barbering are completely different nvq qualifications. I used to be a hairdresser I wasn't a barber. If a man came in the salon I said I'm really sorry I don't do men's hair Gary next door does and he is great. No one was offended. Who exactly are you going to complain to ? The ombudsmen for hair

Insurance is for compensation to third parties for property damage or injury (trips, slips, cuts, chemical burns etc). No insurance policy would cover a bad hair cut as it is subjective and a trade risk. No insurance policy would have an exclusion for specific customers eg men or women only! Although insurance may be compromised if the hairdresser was reckless eg doing work they hadn't been trained to do, this would apply more to say someone doing colour when they had been trained in cutting only which resulted in injury or damage) not in cutting women's hair when you'd been trained in men's. Sorry for the dull and geeky post but really annoys me when people blame insurance for things that's nothing to do with it. Not that the barber said this, but some people are guessing it's the case

Thanks, Frequency, yes I was imagining hairdressers being insured against customer complaints of bad hair and boggling.

I'm sorry but your post was confusing - you said you wanted the sides shaved...but you asked the barber for a trim? A trim involves cutting hair with scissors - maybe he thought you wanted the mohican trimmed and he didn't feel he had the skills to do that.
You said he asked you what you wanted...if he wasn't going to serve you than he would not have asked this - he could have just said, I'm sorry if you are waiting for a haircut I don't serve women. In your words he didn't say this - he asked you want you wanted...I think you have just had a misunderstanding and he felt he didn't have the skills to trim your hair.

For goodness sake if he didn't want to do it then he didn't want to do it. People just complain about absolute bullshit these days - what about the rights of someone who doesn't want to do something? You can't just force people.

Oh for fucks sake.

I took the first thread at face value, but another one?

In case it's legit, find another barber. It's not hard.

In case it's got screenshotting for twitter, it's getting boring now...

He is a barber. He curs men's hair. His service is purely for men. Would you start complaining if a bra fitters refused to fit a man (with mam boobs and genuine need for a bra) or if a salpn that only does women's cuts refused service to a man?

Seems to be epidemic. A barber in Sydney is being sued because he refused to cut a young girl's hair as he did not have the skills. There was a hairdresser next door.

If anyone- male or female, is asking for a cut that is specialised by a barber I don’t see why they should refuse- if you want a shave or clip job- they are as qualified to do so on a male or a female. If you’re asking to have layers cut and a style they are not trained in- every right to refuse. Barbers specialise on short hair- that should be regardless of gender. I’d rather have an undercut with razor shaping done by the person who can do it best- and if that’s a barbershops speciality then gender shouldn’t come in to it.

I agree with ittakes2 that if you asked for a trim the barber might not have understood that you wanted your sides shaved.

Different places do different things. I've quite a few times had hairdressers and barbers say no to whatever - most recently one salon wouldn't use clippers at all and at a specialist barbers that opened nearby I spent several minutes helping my son explain that he wanted one of their really short cuts advertised in the window as at first they just said 'sorry, we don't do long hair'.

Personally, I would rather they said no than do something they don't feel they can do well. There are plenty of horror stories on mumsnet and elsewhere. I'm still trying to find a unisex one locally that will reliably do as asked, my sons particularly seem to have bad luck at repeatedly getting those who like to turn what was asked for into something 'trendier' like either of them is going to style their hair. My hair is ridiculously long partially because of that.

Cool story bro.

(Replying to OP)

Hang on, we had an almost identical thread last week, except it was about their daughter's hair rather than their own.

It's getting silly now.

My partner is a trained barber and refuses to cut my hair on the grounds I'm a woman lol I don't see the difference but he does.

The guys just lost a client. No point trying to change ppl just go somewhere that will give u what u want.

He shouldn't have asked u what u wanted first then refuse though. Bit weird.

Barbers and hairdressers take courses in Men’s barbering and not qualified or insured to cut women’s. They can and probably could but if a woman was then to sue, the barber or hairdresser wouldn’t really have a leg to stand on

And yes this is a deja vu thread. I’ve said threads often get duplicated in a short space of time before on here but nobody seemed to notice or agree lol

My wife has found a barber to cut her hair locally - she has hair similar to the attached pic. She's found a barber to be more confident with using clippers on the short bits. Bargain price of £5 per cut too, as opposed to the £55 she was paying for the same haircut at our local hairdressers...

My point being - some barbers are happy to do it, some aren't. That's their choice... But persevere with looking for a barber if that's your choice!

Barbers don't cut men's hair, they cut men's haircuts. If OP is a woman with a man's haircut, why shouldn't the barber be able to cut her hair? He's not trimming her fucking pubes, her gender shouldn't make a difference.