When we sell our products, especially our kits, we enclose detailed instructions on how to apply and prep the nails for application. We are fastidious about hygiene and mention several times in our instructions to use Anti-Bac and to wash hands before starting anything. This is the same with any products you buy to do this whether they be a kit from the chemist or a kit from us – HYGIENE!!
A few basics about acrylic before I go on… Acrylic powder and Acrylic EMA liquid will not damage your nails (MMA liquid which is commonly used in Asian nail bars, will). BMNE Direct only sell EMA liquids.
We get a lot of people ringing us to ask for information about our kits and how to use them, we always ask if they have had their nails done by a professional, more often than not they have and unfortunately it has been at an Asian nail bar, so now their nails are damaged and they want to try and repair the damage themselves. We tell them to leave their nails for about 3 months with nothing on them to give them time to strengthen and heal and this will also minimise any infection risk with the next application. The other reason we ask is because generally if someone has had their nails done previously then they will have an idea of the application process.
On with the reason for this article…
In late December 2010 we received an email from a customer complaining that her natural nails had deteriorated and were bleeding and that she was on antibiotics, she also said that the powder was not going on smoothly, that her brushes were ruined and it peeled off. We did a quick check and found that she bought a small kit off us in mid October 2010. With this we ask if we had any other complaints about product quality during the time since October 2010 and we found nothing. We sent her the following reply:
Dear XXXXX
I was shocked to read your email.
I have spoken with our nail techs about your email and am not sure where to start.
All our products are professional products and used daily by 100′s of people all over Australia and our own nail techs and we have never had an email like this before.
I want to start to address some of the issues you mentioned:
1. The acrylic powder is too white, does not go on smoothly
Are you using the CLEAR powder? If you do not have the correct liquid to powder ratio and do not have enough liquid in your brush it will not go on smoothly. All our powders are self levelling – i.e. with enough liquid in the brush the mix will level itself on the nail, even I find that sometimes I am too heavy with the liquid and have to use a little less – it is all practice. Because it is a self levelling powder there is never lumps in it when you have the correct amount of liquid.
2. therefore my many brushes are ruined
This is caused because the brushes have not been cleaned correctly after using them. You need to dip the brush in brush cleaner and then wipe over a paper towel, also using a cuticle stick by brushing the long end of the stick through the hairs will also remove excess acrylic.
3. and it peeled off.
This probably happened because your nails were damaged and the acrylic could not adhere, the other cause of this would be because your acrylic mix was too dry.
4. My natural nails have deteriorated too, the quicks all came off and were sore and now my nails are actually bleeding
If your nail are bleeding and infected it sounds like you have filed them down too much, it also sounds like you have saturated the nails in primer – this is an acid based product and one small dab is all you need on each nail. If you saturate the nail it will get into the cuticles and cause damage and then this will lead to an infection.
Can I ask, when you started using our kit had you had your nails done somewhere previously?
Also when prepping the nail you only remove the shine from the top of the nails with a quick buff over with the whiteblock, acrylics should be soaked off and not filed off.
She replied back with a one line email stating that she had used our products for years without incident but did not address any of the issues we raised in our email.
On 28 January 2011, she sent an email that stated “I am the customer where the last lot of acrylic recked(sp) my nails. Do you have any red acrylic powder” She then placed an order for acrylic powder. In light of her blaming our products for the damage to her nails, I told the staff that her order was to be declined. We sent her the following email:
“In light of your previous emails to us about the damage on your nails and your accusations that it was BMNE products that caused the damage, we are not prepared to complete this order for you. We sent you an email on 23 December 2010 explaining why our products could not have damaged your nails.
The damage you described could only have been caused by yourself by filing your natural nails down to far and/or using too much primer, by filing the cuticles (please refer back to that email) and brush damage is caused by not cleaning the brush properly.” BMNE had to make a decision and take ourselves out of any possible firing line and also we believe that it would not have been responsible of us to help her damage her nails any further. She replied that she understood our responses and that is why she reordered and she also said that “it was not an accusation it was the truth”. We knew that we had made the right decision to not supply. And when she placed that order she told us that we should be replacing all her products for free. We sent the following reply..
“Sorry, it is not the truth, you damaged your own nails by not applying the product correctly or by filing down your natural nails too far and weakening them, it is not possible for our products to damage nails.
You then stated on that order that we should be giving you those products for free because you still believe that it was our products that damaged your nails and brush. Taking the brush as an example, again, our products will not damage a brush, damage is caused when a brush is not cleaned thoroughly after each use by either using brush cleaner or monomer in a dappen and wiping over a paper towel repeatedly until all the acrylic product is removed.
All the symptoms you have mentioned are caused by operator error.”
We then heard from her again on May 13 2011, and she emailed photos of her damaged nails in an email with the subject line “Operator Error Indeed”
Clearly she was not prepared to take responsibility for the damage to her nails. From the photos we noted the following:
1. She has applied acrylic to her nails after we advised her not to.
2. There was still acrylic on the nails and she was picking it off and therefore damaging her natural nail plate.
3. The red on the nails clearly indicates that she has filed too far into the natural nail thus weakening the nail.
4. We can see on the little finger that she has filed her cuticles.
Acrylic or gel products can not cause this type of damage, it is Operator Error. We sent these photos onto 2 fully qualified nail technicians who have been in the industry for over 15 years and they both independantly came back with the same conclusions we came to.
We tried to ring the customer to discuss all this with her, but after 1 minute she hung up on us. So what do you do? She then emails with the following “Thanks for the call, however I believe it was your products that did this awful thing to all my nails that are so sore I can hardly use.
I am taking this matter further and please do not bother to call me again with excuses!”
On 18 May she sent another email claiming she had seen her doctor and he says the cause of her nail problems is our products seeing that the damage in on every nail.
Now the TRUTH of the matter is that her doctor has no idea of acrylic nail applications and to state that it is OUR products that have caused the damage is a very dangerous thing for this Doctor to claim. BUT, we only have this customers say so that the Doctor said it was specifically BMNE products. The TRUTH is that she would have ended up with this damage regardless of what brand of products she used because the damage on the nails is caused by too much filing, picking off the acrylic instead of filing or soaking it off carefully and terrible hygiene practices.
The lesson here is that if you are going to do your own nails wether it be with a kit you can buy in the chemist or a kit from us or anywhere else. Do not file into your natural nails, you only file on the application or use a buffer to remove shine before application and good quality files and buffers are not included in chemist kits either. HYGIENE!!! be pedantic about it and spray yuor equipment with Anti-Bac when you have finished, let them dry and then put them away.
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