So Angel Beauty Parlour....where to begin? My story actually starts with them a good two years ago at their Croydon branch when out of sheer desperation for my upcoming holiday, I needed an emergency manicure and pedicure and ABP is where I happened to come across. My initial dealings with them should have deterred me from ever paying a second visit albeit in a different location entirely but you live and learn. So the original visit in Croydon was met with a completely empty salon and a very sullen looking therapist. Not only was the salon itself cold, so was the atmosphere and not one word was exchanged between us throughout the whole treatment! Very unprofessional, a sub standard job and extremely overpriced to boot.
Anyhow, like I said, that was a good two years ago.
On to their Crawley branch....
When waking in I noticed the salon was a lot busier than the Croydon salon so I was feeling optimistic at first.
I waited roughly a minute or so until a therapist asked me if I needed any help. I enquired how much it would be for a gel manicure and gel pedicure and she quoted me £40 for both. Initially this sounded great and I asked what that entailed and all she said was the only thing it didn't include was scrubbing. Because my feet were in a worse for wear state, I asked how much extra scrubbing would be for feet only. She went on to say that the salon was running a special offer for £34.99 and that would include a full spa pedicure. If I took that offer, I would pay just £15 extra for the manicure. All in all £50.
Decided to go for it. The therapist I initially spoke to asked me to take a seat and pick out my gel colours and that there would be around a 10 minute wait.
After choosing my colour and waiting, I was then approached by another therapist who would be the one carrying out my treatments. We sat at a manicure table and she had a quick look at my nails broke picking up a file and moving it back and forth over my nail edge. There was no question put to me regarding nail shape it was just straight in there. After a (very) quick file she picked up a cuticle pusher and immediately starting pushing back my cuticles. No water, no cuticle softener just her and her dry tools.
Now at this point I should have asked where the water bowl for my hands was but I still held out hope that this would follow and perhaps this is what they did initially to somehow prep nails before a treatment.
How wrong was I? After a 30 second dry cuticle push she then asked me to look at my nails and see if I thought they looked ok. This was when I turned around and said that I was very confused as too why my cuticles haven't been cut. Her answer? We don't do the cuticles for a gel
manicure but if I wanted, she would for an extra £5!
Wait. What?
You don't do cuticles for a gel manicure? What sort of nonsense is this? I've been having all sorts of manicures since the age of 16 at all sorts of places (including a market in Shanghai no joke) and not ONCE have my cuticles ever been neglected so what the hell was this?
Part shock, part disbelief I agreed to the cuticle work for £5 extra as there was no way I was having paintwork done for it all to just flood my overgrown cuticles, so on she went with her cuticle clippers and with less than 30 seconds spent on BOTH hands she was done.
You couldn't make this up by now. Once more she asked me to look at my fingers to see if they were ok and at this point I was ready to walk.
I told her under no circumstances were my hands looking ok and that I was both shocked and surprised that the very basics of a manicure were not included in the price. She tried to argue with me about their policy on various manicures etc but as I pointed out to her, all of this should have been made clear at my first point of contact when I spoke to the other therapist regarding prices!
In the end she half heartedly and begrudgingly agreed and I told her I no longer wanted to go ahead with he treatments but not before her then telling me I had to pay her for the work she had done!
Apparently, the 'work' was a mini manicure and cuticles so that would be £15.
I had to laugh before telling her in no uncertain circumstances would I be paying a single penny.
She didn't try to stop me.
Moral of the story? Trust your gut instincts about a place even if they are the same company in different places. It just goes to show you that their therapist and customer service training just isn't their number one priority when above all else it should be.
My advice to you is avoid Angel Beauty Parlour at all costs. I know I'm going to stick to markets in Shanghai from now on. read more