Complaint about makeup lesson

[laurenmck90]

Hello, I just had a beauty lesson to brush up on things for doing my own bridal makeup. I spent about $300 2 weeks ago when working with a lovely sales associate, Andrea who spent a lot of time trying to help me find the right shades. I was ready to spend more but As her manager was calling her away, she advised I book in for a beauty lesson with her to get the rest of the stuff and learn how to use it all together. when I tried to book she wasn’t available online for weeks (there may be a glitch in the system) so I put in the comments that I’d like to go with her as we’d already started the mapping process and she was so helpful. We planned for me to bring all the products I’d bought and get new ones to add on.

When I turned up today I got someone else, that was ok I guess until I was told she had to use “dupes” of what I’d already spent significant money on at Sephora (adding on my previously bought items, adding up to about $600). She said it was for sanitation purposes but my understanding was that this was a lesson, I was to practice myself with her help and these were mostly BRAND NEW, UNUSED products FROM SEPHORA so I didn’t understand that. It defeated the whole purpose. I felt there was little purpose in me doing a lesson with other products as the whole point was to get good at the products recommended to me by Sephora. Throughout the process, she mostly angled me away from the mirror so she could see better but I couldn’t learn much of what she was doing. At one point she unsolicitedly suggested I get dermaplaning “to remove the hairs on my face”. I never felt I had hairs on my face bar the usual waxed upper lip, but now I’m self conscious 3 weeks before my wedding. This made me feel pretty awful tbh. Not how you want to feel a few weeks out from your wedding having paid for a relaxing service!

She took so long to do my foundation and contour, 75mins that there was no time left for eyes which was my main focus feature I wanted help with. She said I’d have to add on $15 for that and I felt I had no choice as I took time off work for this. 

I was kind of shocked by the eye makeup tbh (given I couldn’t even see what she was doing). She went in with black eyeliner in my waterline which I never wear and she never asked me. I have sensitive eyes, it ran and now I’ve a huge smudge under one of my eyes which she didn’t fix (photos below, you can see one eye has a huge black smudge under it) She didn’t finish with mascara or anything. Honestly I feel I’d have done my eye makeup better myself. Throughout this whole process I was kind and polite despite feeling so rushed and disappointed that I’d wasted $75. I did express that I didn’t wear black eyeliner ever and I was surprised we couldn’t work with the products I plan to use which had been bought only recently at the same store, and when multiple reps told me a lesson was a good idea to get to grips with my new products. 

my main purpose was to shade match my foundation and get the correct primer. She forgot to do the samples in the end for the 2 I had narrowed down. I was pretty annoyed over this given more focus was placed on rushing me out of there so she could get lunch.

At the end, she had the audacity to full on ask me to my face for a tip. Even though my card was on file to take payment for the service. I thought this cheeky and put me under pressure as I’m always happy to tip with good service but it was clear this hadn’t gone well. I opted to tip 10% and she made a song and dance about it at the register asking me to tip again. So much so, she made a mistake in taking swapped BI products off my bill and I had to get a refund with the manager. All she cared about was her tip. I cannot believe this honestly. I was spending yet another $300 in Sephora over the last month, totaling what I’ve spent there over the last month to near $1000 and have been a loyal customer for years, I love Sephora, but in this instance I felt mortified. I was so annoyed at having wasted $90 on this lesson I just clicked “no tip” this time which I’m perfectly entitled to do if unsatisfied with a service. She proceeded to say loudly “did you mean to not tip? Just to be clear the previous $9 you tipped didn’t go through”. I am honestly so disappointed in this experience. I had to go and find another rep to help me get the rest of my stuff and spent the rest of time in the store awkwardly avoiding her. 

  

and I would hope someone in customer service would address this as otherwise I won’t be returning anytime soon.

[keelybt]

@laurenmck90 I'm so sorry to hear about this experience and appreciate you bringing this to our attention.  It looks like your private messages are currently turned off. Please send me a private message with your registered email address and the date and location of your Beauty Lesson or you can contact us by phone at 1-877-737-4672 or through our live chat for assistance> https://www.sephora.com/beauty/customer-service
 

[laurenmck90]

Hello, I now have my private messages turned on. Please can you message me?

[laurenmck90]

Hi, nobody has reached out to me about this