Nail Artist Contract Template: What to Include

She turns up at week seven, with two nails gone and lifting on four more, and asks for a fill. You are about to have a conversation about what counts as a fill, what counts as a repair, and what all of it costs. Neither of you has anything in writing.

Most beauty services are a single transaction. Nail work is a relationship with a maintenance cycle, and almost every disagreement in it happens in the gap between appointments.

Worth saying first: this is a practical guide to the terms nail artists commonly set, not legal advice. Consumer rules differ by country, province and state. If you are writing terms that involve keeping deposits or charging cancellation fees, have the final wording checked locally.

Nail work has more grey areas than most

Someone books a facial, has the facial, pays for the facial. A nail client comes back every two or three weeks for months, and the questions that cause trouble are all about what happened in between.

Whose fault is the breakage. Whether week six still counts as a fill. Whether a soak off of someone else’s acrylic is included or extra. Whether the client who picked her set off after four days gets a free repair. None of these have obvious answers, which is exactly why they need answers you decided in advance, in writing, when nobody was upset.

The seven terms to set

Nail client terms checklist

• 1. Fill schedule. The interval fills are priced for, and what happens outside it.
• 2. Repairs and breakages. What is covered, for how long, and what is charged.
• 3. Removal and soak off. Your own work, other artists' work, and the price of each.
• 4. Aftercare. What the client agrees to do, and what voids a free repair.
• 5. Deposits. Which appointments carry one and whether it transfers.
• 6. Late arrivals and cancellations. The notice you need and the cut off for a shortened service.
• 7. Photo permission. Separate from everything else, with social media use stated on its own.

Wording you can adapt

Fill schedule

“Fills are priced for clients returning within 2 to 3 weeks with at least [number] enhancements intact. If more than [number] weeks have passed, or fewer than [number] nails remain, the appointment will be charged as a rebalance at $X or a new full set at $Y. Please book your fill before you leave so the interval works out for both of us.”

Fill in the numbers with what is actually true for your work rather than copying someone else’s. An artist doing hard gel on short natural nails has a genuinely different interval to one doing long acrylic extensions.

Repairs and breakages

“If a nail lifts or breaks within 7 days of your appointment through no fault of your own, I will repair it free of charge. Please contact me as soon as it happens rather than waiting for your next appointment. Repairs after 7 days, and damage caused by picking, biting, prising, or using your nails as tools, are charged at $X per nail.”

The phrase that does the work here is “through no fault of your own”, because it lets you be generous where a set genuinely failed and firm where a client took a staple out with her thumb.

Removal and soak off

“Soak off of enhancements applied by me is included with your next service. Soak off of work applied elsewhere is charged at $X, and time should be added to your appointment for it. Please tell me when booking if you are wearing enhancements from another artist so I can allow enough time.”

That last sentence prevents the most common scheduling problem in nail work, which is a ninety minute appointment that needed a hundred and thirty.

Aftercare

“Your enhancements are strong but not indestructible. Please wear gloves for cleaning and washing up, use cuticle oil daily, and never use your nails to open, pull or scrape anything. Picking or peeling your enhancements off will damage your natural nail plate and voids the free repair period.”

Late arrivals

“If you arrive more than 15 minutes late I may need to shorten your service or reschedule, because the appointment after yours cannot be moved. The full price still applies. If you know you are running late, message me and I will tell you honestly whether we can still fit it in.”

Cancellations and deposits

“Please give at least 24 hours notice to cancel or rearrange. Appointments over two hours, and bridal or group bookings, are held with a deposit of $X which comes off your total. With 24 hours notice your deposit moves to your new date. With less notice, or a no show, the deposit is kept.”

Put a price next to every rule

This is the part most artists skip, and it is the part that saves the awkward conversations.

When to send it

Once, with the first booking confirmation, before a new client’s first appointment. Not on arrival, not at the table, and not after something has gone wrong.

For existing clients, send it as a one-off message with a short introduction. “I have written my booking terms down properly so everything is clear: fills, repairs, deposits and cancellations. Nothing here is new, it is just in one place now. Have a read and let me know if anything is unclear.”

Most people will skim it and reply with a thumbs up. That is fine. The point is not that they memorise it. The point is that it exists, they received it, and the next time somebody arrives at week seven with four nails left, you are pointing at a shared document rather than making a judgement call while she watches your face.

Keep it with the client, not in your email

The agreed copy needs to live attached to the client record, dated, alongside her service history and payments. That is the only place you will reliably find it at the moment you need it, which is always mid appointment, on your phone, with someone waiting.

Written once, sent at booking, stored with the client. Three small habits that quietly remove most of the friction from a job where the difficult conversations otherwise happen while you are holding somebody’s hand.

Frequently asked questions