I've been going to Happy Nails for almost 10 years now (on and off of course). Most of the time I've gone to the one in the South Bay Galleria location and found an talented manicurist named Tiffany. When it comes to acrylics, she was the person I went to. She even did my nails for my wedding.
Of course acrylics are awful on your really nails, so I don't really like to do them that often. Well recently they've come out with colored nail gels that aren't as harsh on your nails and last up to two weeks. Of course when I found this out I wanted to try it. Unfortunately when I went into the salon, Tiffany was busy and I was sent to a different lady or should I say two different ladies.
The first lady I was sent to, I had seen many times while Tiffany was working on my nails, her name was Donna and she did my manicure. After Donna was done, I was handed off to a girl named Yuki. Yuki had cute petite hands with full set of acrylics on, so I was excited... if her nails were that well kept, I figured she'd be able to do a good job on mine as well. Boy was i wrong!!
My manicure looked amazing but I think because they were so busy Yuki was bouncing in between clients when she was applying my nail gel. The nail gel uses UV rays to dry each layer/application. It was my first time trying to nail gel that i didn't know what was right or wrong. So i found out the hard way that Yuki didn't know how to put on the nail gel properly.
After Yuki was done, my nails were still dull and sticky so I showed the Salon manager since Yuki was busy with another customer and the manager informers me that it just needs old and puts more cuticle oil on my nails. Needless to say that didn't work but I let it go and went home and applied a top coat over it instead. Two days later the nail color on my right index finger started to peel. Keep in mind this nail gel is suppose to last up to two weeks. Of course I get a little irritated at this but just let it go hoping its just that one finger and it wont peel to badly. By the third day almost my whole right hand's nail color was peeling off. Unfortunately, I was out of town and couldn't get back to the nail salon to have them fix the problem.
Once I got back home a week later I decided to head straight Happy Nails from the airport in order to have them fix my nails. When I arrived at the nail salon, the salon Manager tells me that Yuki couldn't do it that day and made me an appointment 3 days later. Being that Yuki applied them the first time of course I was really hesitant to have her redo them but the Manager wouldn't let anyone else do my nails.
So I went back 3 days later to have Yuki fix my nails. Apparently there was some miscommunication bewteen Yuki and the manager about having my nails fixed. Instead Yuki redid everything as if I wanted to pay for her to apply the nail gel on again. She took off the nail gel on the left hand (since there was no nail gel left on the right hand by that time) and have me a manicure as well as applying the new nail gel. After she was done I was about to just tip her and leave when she tells me I owed her the full amount. Of course I was confused and told her no I came in because my whole right hand peeled off starting after the second day.
Yuki went on to say that I peeled off my right hand and that the nail gel isn't guaranteed to last two weeks. In no way did i expect it to last two weeks, but my WHOLE right hand was peeling/peeled off while my left hand was fine in less than a week?! Also when i told her that it started peeling after two days, she basically implied that I was lying. Let me remind you that the day she applied my nail gel she was going back an forth between me and other clients so she wasn't paying attention to how she was applying the nail gel. In the end I told her that I'd pay but that I will definitely not be coming back ever!!, which didn't seem to matter to Yuki and/or the Salon Manager. At that point I realized that at Happy Nail salons they don't care about the customers happiness, it's all about the money. And even after she redid my nails they were still dull and sticky because she didn't apply them correctly, but I was over the whole situation and had to get out of that nail salon.
I probably don't need to tell you guys but I will NEVER be going back to Happy Nails. After that horrible experience with not just Yuki but also the awful nail gel, I decided to try a different nail salon that I normally go to for pedicures (Bellagio Nails) for the nail gel and let me just tell you.. SO much better! it lasted two weeks no problem. I'm actually going to get them redone this week before I head off to Hawaii.
So the moral of the story is... AVOID happy nails at all cost!
xx
j
