Why you should check insurance cover when learning new nail techniques

Continued professional development (CPD) ensures that you maintain and enhance the knowledge and skills you need to deliver a professional service to your customers. Constant updating of skills is vital to success in any industry, but it’s especially true in the nail and beauty industry. CPD is about keeping up-to-date with the latest treatments, products, techniques, equipment and business developments.

While CPD is only compulsory in some industries and job roles such as if you are an assessor or verifier, it can be equally useful and important to keep on top of in all industry roles.

When did you last update your techniques and skills? If you have to think about it, it has probably been too long and it is necessary for all skill and experience levels.

CPD doesn’t necessarily mean updating your technical skills directly, it can be brand and chemistry knowledge or even business seminars or health & safety education.

While some insurance companies don’t always require nail technicians to carry out a stated amount of CPD points annually, they do state for any new techniques and methods, accredited training in that exact process is essential. This means that if you attended your original L&P training course 10 years or even only 1 month ago, procedures and trends are likely to have changed in that time frame.

Maybe you learnt tip application and have since taught yourself sculpting or originally mastered how to create smile lines by applying the white first and have now updated your methods to perform pink first application. If this was not demonstrated and practically assessed by your tutor in your original course and you haven’t attended another accredited class to learn this new exact method you are performing on your customers, then you may not be insured.

This rule extends to using different brands.

One gel polish may work differently to another and it’s essential to attend training in that brand to ensure you’re getting the best out of the product for both you and your customers.

I often see social media posts blaming a product for tech issues, yet the tech hasn’t attended training with that particular brand of product. So, the issue is therefore just a guess because without training, the product can not been fully understood and mastered. Even if a tech is competent in a technique, there is always something to learn and every brand is not the same as another with different application methods.

This is also applicable when adding different systems to your services, such as changing from hard gel to acrygel and assuming that you are capable of adding an alternative system without training. If you were qualified in facial services but not massage, you wouldn’t carry this treatment out without attending massage training. These treatments are similar but completely different, just like different nail systems. Acrygel and hard gel are two very different systems with different application methods and chemistry. While it may appear that you can create a perfectly acceptable set with this new system, without training you cannot guarantee that you truly understand the application techniques and chemistry. Again, insurance comes into play as this will not be valid if using a system that you have not received training in as well as putting your clients nail integrity and your reputation at risk.

Gel polish is a system in itself and it is paramount if you are qualified in L&P or hard gel that you still attend official gel polish training to ensure you hold a qualification for this. It is essential as a professional nail technician and to be compliant with insurance policies, that you hold an accredited certificate for this service, even when offering it over enhancements as well as natural nails.

Don’t get left behind and caught out by not keeping up-to-date with CPD or thinking ‘basic’ training is beneath you and not keeping up with all and all the latest techniques and skills.

Love Katie B x