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1. Leave clean and dirty stuffs in one place

This is a common mistake. This could be due to lack of either awareness or carefulness; or it could be because he/she is too busy with work, thus s/he does not follow the rules properly.

It should be clearly understood that in the rules, it is required to put the clean and dirty in two different places (two boxes). Also there must be the label “clean” or “soiled/dirty” for each box. Otherwise, you will be fined from $100 up.

This is a mistake that happens quite frequent in nail salons. This is also a regrettable situation that easily leads to fine.

In fact, there are many technicians got fined because in their working box (considered as pretty new and decent) but it contains small white acrylic powder. It is such an unexpected situation.

2. Dip the wooden stick into wax more than one time

While waxing, be careful to avoid a stick (such as wooden stick) dipping into wax more than one time. Each time you have to use a new stick for waxing, according to the law.

The action of re-use the stick will be fined by the time it is recognized.

The nail technicians doing the waxing often do not pay attention to this case. The salon owner sometimes does not notice because of the thought of saving. It is not until the fine to be sorry about the small saving action, which leads to bigger issue.

3. Don’t hang the nail certificates at the working place.

The law requests that the nail certificates must be hang on the wall or an easy-to-see place in the salon.

No hanging (for any reasons) will lead to fines, which is a pity.

There was a case that a technician took out the certificate to change the frame but she forgot to bring it in the next day. She thought it was okay and worked as usual because there was only one day. However, there was unexpected inspection, and she was fined … She could only blame on her carelessness. Such kind of risk could happen anytime without any warning.

4. Don’t change frequently the disinfectants or don’t keep it clean

There are many technicians and nail salons got fined from the mistake. The disinfectant is not clean or there is a strange thing inside such as dust, nail or the color of the solution is dirty, all have the high risk to be fined. It should be noticed to change the antibiotic frequently and keep it clean.

If there is sign of uncleanliness, it must be stopped using and replaced immediately.

5. Don’t leave the lid on the cream or powder right after use

This is also a common mistake and a reason that many technicians and nail salons got fined. This happens often due to the carelessness or underestimating the action. 

Keep in mind that the contaminated dust, chemical vapors can cling into cream boxes or powders very quickly when we do not cover immediately. No need to mention its consequences yet. When the first inspection is assessed as not good hygiene, the possibility of fines is almost certain.

To sum up, these 5 common mistakes are deserved to pay more attention and put more carefulness to avoid the fines.

Co-workers we remind each other. Salon owners notice to remind the technicians when we see the mistakes, to protect ourselves and help the business develop more stable and safely.

With a not white and healthy nail set, women would be less confident because of its non – beauty and ugly appearance.

Good news: if your nails has signal to be gray along time or be dull due to the external effect, you can remedy this issue with bunch of simple methods.

Below is the instruction to whiten your nails. You can also apply this method for toenails.

Soaking nail into the major remover water

Fingernails have a lot of calcium and other ingredients as same as your teeth’s. Thus, teeth cleaner is also effective to your fingernails or toenails.

If you need, go ahead to a medicine store and buy some common teeth cleaning tablets, then melting one in warm water and lastly, put hands into this mix.

After 5 minutes, get hands out and wash by warm water.

You will not suffer from skin irritation or other problems because this kind of medicine is very safe for teeth, so do hands.

The best way is to use this some times per week to get the good result.

Whiten nails by using lemon and soap

It is very effective to use lemon for the nail whitening because of its strong acid. When your nails are darker due to banana or tomato or different kinds of pus, you can use lemon or kumquat to completely remove them from your nails.

With the combination between lemon and soap, it is such a very high – advanced method to get the better result.

The basic principle in this formula is to use the lemon to break the links among dirt, polish and nails, then soap will help to clear them all from your nail.

Use the vinegar

Vinegar is light acid chemical to remove the dirt on the hard surface of fingernails or toenails.

In this case, you had better use the vinegar because it does not have any pigment that can react and make your nails to be darker/ uglier.

Whiten the nails by toothpaste cream

As mentioned, the ingredients of the fingernails are the same as teeth’s. So you can use this cream to whiten your nails.

Use a little pea of cream for each nail surface. Then, use the brush to work slowly on each nail within 5 minutes before washing by warm water.

Repeat your duty for nails per week to get the highest result.

Use salt and lemon to whiten the nails:

Salt is considered as a basic chemical that can connect with lemon’s ingredient to remove any dirt on the very hard surface such as your fingernails.

Use some salt and pure lemon water with 1:1 ratio, stir into the mix in a bowl.

Use cotton pad to take some and apply on the nails that are needed to be white. It needs to keep this work during 5 minutes before washing by the warm water.

Removing the nail polish is one of the important step in the nail worker’s process. However, the nail worker needs to get the certain knowledge about nail products to select the safe nail polish remover product. It is the product that not only assured to clear the nail polish safely, but also restricted the harm to both customers and workers.

Two types of nail polish remover

There are acetone and non – acetone. Both are solvent. They work on melting resin, plasticizers, film formers or color pigments in the nail polish.

However, these two types are also different from safety for the users:

-          Acetone Nail Polish remover: it make epidermis and nail skin dry; has bad smell; the nail would be broken if frequently used; quickly remove the polish.

-          Non – acetone/ Aceton – Free Nail Polish remover: it does not affect to the epidermis as well as the the nail skin; not have the badly chemical smell; not harmful for long using; needs longer time staying on nail to remove the dirt completely.

So which one should be chosen?

For all the requirements of the nail industry, health is one of the leading factors. However, you can consider  to get the best choice:

1.       Aceton Nail Polish remover is the most common and cheapest. Its ingredient includes: Acetone, Ethyl Acetone, Toluene, Propyline Carbonate, Alcohol, and acetone is account of 60% of remover water’s ingredients.

Acetone Nail Polish remover can easily remove the polish but it would affect badly to the nail being weak and broken, especially acrylics or gel nails. According to OSHA, using this chemical for long would get sickness such as skin problem, eyes irritation, breath difficulty, chronic bronchitis, liver and kidney problem,…

The advantage of acetone is to remove the polish very quickly. Thus, it is useful for removing the dark colors such as: holographic, shimmer, glitter or shellac (no – chip).

2.       Non – Acetone Nail Polish Remover is the product that should be chosen if you want to remove the nail polish and keep healthy for the users. Non – acetone doesn’t contain acetone. It has propylene carbonate, ethylacetate or tocopherylacetate… with small amount for each, which are not harmful for your nails. Non – acetone is very effective to the delighted pigments, dry and effective hand skin, acrylic or gel nails.

The disadvantage is that it takes more time than acetone to melt the polish’s ingredients, especially for the dark pigments.

3.       Non – acetone Nail Polish remover is organic or natural because of its non – acetone solvent. Besides that, it contains some enriched moisture ingredients such as glycerin, panthenol and soybean oil, aloe vera, wheat protein, gelatin, vitamin C, vitamin E or conditioners. Although its removing time is longer than acetone, the organic remover has the gentle smell and safe.

Some notes:

Nowadays, removers of nail polish is various. But it also needs to get attention on the bad effect of non – acetone products. Instead of acetone containing, these non – acetone products has methanol (which is a kind of toxic for nail). Therefore, the users/ buyers had better select the most suitable and safe one by checking out the harmful chemicals writing on the product label.

So, users should choose Organic nail polish remover.

After using the remover, always apply moisture for skin and nails by enriched cream or nail care oil,…This work would help the skin/ epidermis to be recoved, lack of harm from nail polish to hands,  limit the damages that would be happened.

Using acetone to clean the nails is one of the main reason for getting yellow, weak and easily broken ones that these consequences are from chemicals in acetone. However, we are able to clean nails without using it by some ways:

1.       Fruit wine:

Pour some fruit wine into the cotton pad and put that on your nail. After 10 – 15 minutes, you will use this cotton pad to brush lightly to remove the polish on your nail. Finally, soak your nail into warm water and dry by other cotton piece.

2.       Lemon juice and vinegar:

Make a mix including small amount of pure lemon, vinegar and stir them. Then, use a cotton pad that already has the mix and put on the nail, also brush in very light way to remove the polish lately. You would rather do it some repeating times to get cleaner but you will not worry about the chemicals effect.

3.       Body spray

This kind is also to help removing nail polish easily. Use a cotton pad with full of body spray to brush your nail. The layer of the polish would be eliminated quickly. Lastly, clean the nail by warm water and put some enriched scream to make soft hands.

4.       Baking soda

Baking soda is one of greatest things to remove dirt and it can easily be bought in bakery making stores. To remove the nail polish, make a sticking mixture from baking soda and warm water, put on the nail fully and stay in this condition within 15 minutes. After all, use a small brush to clear the polish and dry it by soft, clean and warm fabric.

5.       Toothpaste cream

Don’t be surprised! You can really clear your nail by using this material. Put some toothpaste cream on the nail, brush the nail in round and do that one more time with the small brush tool. Finally, use warm fabric to dry the nail.

6.       Nail polish

Please polish your nail, leave that some minutes and use the cotton bud to clear the both old and new layers. After removing them, soaking hands into warm water and use cotton pad to dry.

In doing nails business, it is necessary to take care of the customers ‘nails problem. Splitting nails is a common situation. In this case, nail workers need to understand the nail process and have the suitable solution. That is because the very skillful nail polish put may not cover the mistake completely, it is also because splitting nail would be worsen.

Splitting nail’s causes

Splitting nails is popular for middle aged women and higher age people. When the body oil connecting the nail corneum layers is being reduced, the nail would be splatted.

Nail is one of the body part that contains the natural structure (including 18% of water and under 5% of lipid). Therefore, the dry and lacking moisture condition on nail would make split, broken, weaker and thinner. At the beginning, the nail would be fray, then it is more broken and layers on nail would be splitted. There are some reasons such as:

-                People don’t have enough vitamin (mainly Iron Deficiency) or people get Hypothyroidism.

-                People use the toxic or non – health nail remover

-                People using gel, acrylic because the nail hardeners ingredient such as alcohols, formaldehyde can weaken the nail.

-                People using nail polish, remover toner,… having acetone, toluene, dibutyl phthalate that would stimulate the dry and splitting nail condition.

What do the nail workers do?

When the nail splits, the nail technicians should:

-                Clip the splitting part carefully.

-                Do not clip and file the dry nail because of the worsen nail condition. The better way is clipping and filing the nail after soaking it into water. The workers should file the nail carefully to avoid more hurt. Filing the nail should go from the edge to the middle of the nail in very skillful way to limit the bad effect on the nail and it is about 180 – 240 grit.

-                Do not use the metal tools to clear the skin epidermis.

-                Buff the nail gently along the nail growth vertically to avoid the worsen split of the nail.

-                Take note to protective layer on nail that it should be taking care before base coat: put an enriched oil layer to nurture the better nails. The ingredients inside the oil would fulfill the nail surface as a primer and provide the moisture to protect it against the latter layers. Over that, some nail workers also use the nail strengthener before the base coat to strengthen the structure and grow nail more healthily.

-                Use the “eco – friendly” nail care materials, avoid harsh ones that can make the disadvantages for the customers.

Nail self-care method for customer

When customers face the nail splitting condition, the workers should guide them to take care of them at home:

-                Hydrate: do that more often and daily. After washing hands, put the material on nail and the epidermis around like ointment, cuticles oil (shear butter, jojoba oil, avocado oil,….) In addition, the enriched cream should have protein (keratin and collagen), petroleum, lanolin, mineral oil, alpha – hydroxyl acids, lactic acid, glycerin.

-                Wear the gloves when it is in the home working situation with some kinds of harmful materials.

-                Drink or use Gelatin capsules, Biotin (2,5 mg/ day) to get more essential vitamins for nurturing the strong and healthy nails, reducing the splitting nail.

-                Have a good eating routine with rich iron, vitamin, and protein (red meat) food.

After this time without the better improvement, you should go to see the doctor. It may be relevant to skin problems, hypothydorism, anemia,… It may also take 6 months – 1 year to recover and successfully remove the nail splitting problem.

Because of the cold – dry weather or directly use the chemicals, the epidermis around as well as the nails would easily be vulnerable. With this kind of skin epidermis, your nails seem to be uglier or even make you feel painful. Therefore, nails and its surrounding care are very essential to be beautiful and healthy. Almond oil is the best choice for nails problem, such as being dry or broken. Almond oil is the most effective treatment to nuture and moisturize the nails. With big amount of vitamin E ( anti – oxigen ingredient), almond oil prevents cuticle from not being peeled and dry; morever, vitamin E also stimulates quick nail growth, goes against skin vulnerability, aging and skin problems.

Although there are many different kinds of making soft for cuticle from various companies, the result is only temporary. If you want to take care and effectively treat your dry skin epidermis problem, you should use the almond oil. This oil’s effect would help you nuture your skin, while vitamin E is very beneficial for deeper levels of the skthe in around your nails.

How to get the right almond oil?

First, Almond oil should be cold pressed to get the market quality. It is because this oil is burnt in process and would be lost some valuable things while being removed.

The true Almond oil should not get the special smell. Some comestic companies add the smell to make customers believe that this oil is natural. But this work can hurt the sensitive skin or cover the putrid almond. Therefore, you need to avoid smelling almond oil.

How to use the Almond oil?

Before applying the oil to the nails, it is assured to have a non – polish nails as well as other chemicals. You can pour a small amount of this oil to the palm and gently massage your full hand’s skin and your nails, your epidermis. This is to absorb the oil faster.

For the heavily damaged nail, you can soak the nail into almond bowl within 2 minutes. It will apply to your nails quickly. With the redundant oil, use that to massage your hand.

Another way: you can use a cotton pad to soak into the Almond oil, then rub your nails. All your nails should be covered by Almond oil and waited for some minutes to get absorbed. It is easy to adapt this method at every time. After using 10 – 14 days, you will see the better nails that you would have.

If you want to get good benefit, you are able to use Almond oil 1 – 2 times/ week.

Nail job in America: Some things about salary that the owners need to know

For a long time, there are many Vietnamese nail owners always cover the salary (salary cover method) for their employees because of their demand. Through this way, the employee has to follow the schedule arranged and is paid for a certain money whether she has clients or not. At usual, this method is to apply with the comission that the employee will be given “extra money” if their collection is more than their salary cover.

Almost Vietnamese nail owner living in America still basically believe that it is normal to cover their emplyees’ salary. They believe to their two side agreement. From that, there are a lot of flyers or tiny advertisement show Vietnamese nailshop owner’s way when they want to get more workers. However, it is risky because their ignorance can be violated to Federal and State labour regulations that they will be fined heavily when they are being checked. In additional, salary cover is one of the main cause of Nail Salon worker – owner litigations which have happened recently.

Salary cover – some things that need to know

For the tax duty and labour regulation, the Nail worker can be an employee or self employed/ independent contractor. However, it is not normal such as most Vietnamese Nail shop owner think. It is dependant on the very complex regulation by IRS ( US Department of Labour), and each State regualtion of labour. The Nail Shop owner should distinguish carefully what is “self – employed/ independent contractor” in State rule or Federal rule since its difference.

Tax duty

On the side of tax duty, the worker is considered to be an “employee” when he/she is paid salary following the W- 2 sample so that the owner will get no trouble with IRS or State’s tax office. In opposite, the owner has to demonstrate their worker being “self employed/ independent contractor when they use the 1099 – MISC sample, which they will be tested by IRS or State tax office based on their own set. As a result, the Nail shop owner would be paid the past to present tax and extra heavy fine if IRS or State tax office confirm the worker being employee.

 The Labour regulation

If the worker is an “employee”, the owner is obliged to Federal, State and local labour regulation for workers’salary.

Based on the Fair Labour Standards Act 206 and 207, and the State labour regulation through America, “employee” will be paid the minimum wage, and the overtime pay if it has. It is noted that this basic regulation of the Fair Labour Standard Act must be applied to the employee’s profit in all cases of part time or comission share or salay cover. The Nail shop owners still have to make the clear information of working time and pay following the Fair Labour Standard Act within 7 days / per week. More importantly, the salary cover must be more or at least equal to totally regulated working time. It is also more to plus the overtime pay. If the “total” counted is not more than the minimum wage and the overtime pay of the worker, the owner has to pay for the difference.

In case that the Nail Salon owner classifies the worker to be “self employed/ independent contractor” so there is no need to oblige to “employee” regulation. However, the main factor to be an “independent contractor” following to the tax duty as well as the labour regulation is the right to control of the owner to the worker. If the owner has the right to control, the worker would be an “employee”. Therefore, the worker can not be an “offical independent contractor” if they are covered food and daily money by the owner, because it is the signal that the owner has controled their working time and their money.

In conclusion, the Nail Shop owner can cover the salary for “employee” following to the Labour regulation. But the amount must be included the minimum wage and overtime pay counting on their working time. The owner can not conduct the salary cover for “Independent contractor” and they are unable to avoid their mistake.

Some years recently, Nail Shops through America have been tested by the Fair Labour Ministry and State labour offices. Most shops had to pay the heavy fine for their violation when they had been tested, mainly the pay. Besides that, many Vietnamese Nail Shop owners must cost thousands of Dollars because of ligitations of salary. It can be said about Natalie Salon branches in North California, and Envy Nails in some cities in New York State. In South California, a Nail Shop in Orange city has coped with the Vietnamese nail workers’ ligitation for 2 years. It it not only Vietnamese Nail Shop owners but also Mexican and Ecuador’s are sued.

With the present issue, it’s time for all the Nail Shop owners need to understand deeply about the labour regulation and pay issue to make the good preparation for avoiding the violation when they are being tested. In addition, they can also avoid the claims and ligitations from their workers. With the new regulation of AB – 2437 that has been launched and valid at the beginning of 2017, Nail Shop owners in Caifornia need to take care their knowledge to avoid the dark sides. They need to understand one more thing that is no mercy for violatingthe rules/ regulation. In that occasion, the owners have to pay for their fault.