Coronavirus Update - The Chapel Hairdressing

Dear Guests,

We couldn’t be more excited to be open again to look after you and help you feel more you.

To provide (more than ever before!) deserved ‘me time’ respite for you all, we’ll all need to participate to ensure the new procedures and guidelines are carried out as smoothly and easily as possible.

We appreciate this is a lengthier update than usual, however, it’s imperative that we all understand what has changed, so we’ve summarised in brief and expanded with details and reasonings beneath.

What You Need To Know (And How We Can Look After Each Other): Bullet points with full reasoning below.

• Please bring a face covering with elastic hooked behind your ears. This MUST be worn for the duration of your visit at the salon.
• Please arrive just in time for your scheduled appointment. (Gov. guidelines)

You must organise a skin test prior to your appointment if:
- you have not had a colour appointment or skin test within 6 months.
- if you have used a box-dye since your last colour appointment.
- if you have suffered from an illness that has recently put your immune system under strain (Coronavirus is an example of this). Any illness that puts your immune system under strain may cause your body to overreact to colour services.

If you are under any doubt or concern that a recent illness may include you, you must come in for a skin test 48 hours or more before your appointment. Please see our skin test guidelines here and for details of our new Skin Test Booking system on our App.

Please familiarise yourself with the new procedures and guidelines outlined in detail, prior to your visit.

Our primary method is still telephone bookings as it allows the fastest ‘back and forth’ with finding dates and will lead to you getting what you want soonest.

We are only booking as far as the 26th September in Sevenoaks and Tunbridge Wells (12 weeks from the 4th July) as we want to ensure these new, longer opening hours are sustainable for the teams’ wellbeing. This will help ensure that we avoid disrupting bookings beyond the 26th September. We will continuously review this and update via all communications channels as soon as we know.

We have reactivated the App/Late Availability sidebar on the website for the simplest services for now. These are the Cut & Finish, Gent’s Cut, and Blowdry services as they are the least complex to book and will allow very easy rebookings based on your previous/usual appointment lengths. You can download the app here.

Please avoid bringing unnecessary items such as large bags, shopping, coats/umbrellas unless absolutely necessary.

Please come alone and do not bring guests, family members or pets with you unless you have a carer or partner helping with health and mobility issues or have a guide dog.

Please use hand sanitiser provided, before and after your visit.

Have you had the recent onset of a new continuous cough? Do you have a high temperature? Have you noticed a loss of, or change in, normal sense of taste or smell? If yes to any of these symptoms, however mild, you must stay at home and reschedule your appointment. (Gov. guidelines)

To protect you, your fellow guests and our teams we reserve the right to reschedule any person attending with symptoms. Please notify us in advance and we’ll do our best to find you a new appointment as soon as possible.

Important Temporary Changes (for 12 weeks starting 4th July):

• Initial appointment length may be a little longer (only upon individual requests by your stylist and they’ll explain why in person.)
• Our opening hours are increasing in Tunbridge Wells and Sevenoaks salons for 12 weeks which means that for those salons we have reduced the number of people in the building by 1/3rd and we are only taking bookings for the first 12 weeks.
• The stylists will have different start times, meaning that it should reduce the number of guests arriving to 2 or 3 at a time.
• Most stylists’ working days and hours will be temporarily changing - any affected appointments for future bookings should have been rearranged with you by now. Please call us if we were unsuccessful in contacting you.
• We have introduced one-way systems in our salons and created socially distanced seating for additional safety across all aspects of your visit.
• We have created new, social distancing workflows within separate mini-teams to minimise equipment/product sharing and all stylists are individually equipped with personal cleaning products and sustainable safety gear.
• We will be taking payments from the comfort of your salon chair before the end of your visit. This should prevent queuing when checking out. We recommend downloading and setting up Apple Pay or Google Pay beforehand on your phone which will negate the need to touch the terminals

If you would like to know more or have unanswered questions thus far, please see our in-depth information below. Salon specific details like new opening hours have been updated on here.

Skin Safety Tests

The safety of our guests has always been paramount to us all and we are pleased that continuing these same practices is just as simple and easy as before.

The good news is that our skin safety test procedures are still the same; if you have had a colour service with The Chapel 6 months prior to your appointment, no further skin test is required.

However, following advice from our colour suppliers, we do have one new exception - if you have used a box colour between appointments, we will need to carry out a new skin test.

For many of you, this 3 month period of being closed may mean that your last appointment was over 6 months ago and you require a skin test.

For anyone that requires a skin test, this must be done at least 48 hours prior to your appointment.

Booking Procedures - phoning is the best method for booking

Telephone bookings will temporarily be the only method of booking, as it will allow for the quickest agreement of times and dates.

Our booking app and emails will not be in use for the early part of bookings due to the nature of the way they work (there is a lag between request and booking which we feel will be very unreliable and may lead to disappointment).

If you are unable to call us or get through, we will return missed calls as fast as possible. We are able to see all incoming calls (as long as your number is not withheld) and one of our team will call back in order, in which the calls were received.

Booking Times & Opening Hours

Appointment Lengths

The whole team has been working through their guest lists to tailor and personalise your experience to give you the very best results, allowing them to be the most professional stylist they can be. What this means, is that as we haven’t seen some of you for a long time and lots may have changed with your hair (especially colour and grown out styles), they may have selected slightly longer appointment times for you on your initial visits.

The booking team will inform you of how long your stylist or the team collectively have recommended for you. Your stylist will then take the time to tailor your appointment times in future, and in conversation with you. Some salons will have dramatically changed rosters, others less so - the new hours are available here.

Opening Hours & Stylists’ Schedules

We have created a temporary new roster with new, longer opening hours, which means that for our busiest salons we have reduced the number of people in the building by 1/3rd. The stylists will have different start times, meaning that it should reduce the number of guests arriving, to 2 or 3 at a time.

New hours available by clicking here.

If you have an existing appointment that falls outside of their new hours, we should have been rearranged with you by now. Please call us if we were unsuccessful in contacting you.

Our New Environment

There will be clear signage explaining the new procedures in place. We ask that you wait outside, following the signage, whilst we greet and seat each guest. For everybody's safety, all guests and Chapel team members are required to wear face coverings - face coverings should hook around the ears. Your stylist will have a designated seating area for each guest and they will greet you there - we respectfully request that you do not bring non-essential company with you and bring as little as possible by way of coats and bags. 

Our Safety Changes

At The Chapel, we are extremely fortunate to have a lot of space which makes social distancing easier for us than for other businesses. Our sections are designed with the mirror as a screen and are a minimum of 2 metres apart, so we don’t need to provide extra screening.

New rosters are in place to minimise the number of guests arriving or leaving at any one time.

Seating areas have also been redesigned with safe social distancing in mind and your stylist has designated seating areas for each guest and to use throughout the day (they keep the same styling chairs and clean them after every use.)

The team have also been given their own cleaning equipment which they’ll have at their sections at all times so they are the only ones that touch and use them. This includes face coverings, antibacterial spray, equipment sterilising spray, alcohol gel, cleaning cloths and wooden spatulas to use for styling products.

When working closely with you the team will be wearing face shields instead of masks in line with government guidelines and these will be one per stylist which will be cleaned after each use.

At The Chapel, all our salons are equipped with on-premise laundry and drying facilities, and as always our towels and gowns are washed on-site between every use.

We have also created a buddy system for our teams which means they stay together to perform the jobs that are needed to be done around the salons, and be assigned cleaning duty, laundry and other essential tasks on a daily basis, minimising the number of people in areas throughout the day.

Refreshments - Magazines

The government guidelines dictate that for now we are only able to provide water as a refreshment whilst visiting us, and we are not allowed to provide magazines during this time.

We will be offering water which will be filtered and provided in reception areas.

Sustainable Safety

We’re passionate that our dedication to safety makes you feel safe and looked after whilst coming, with the least impact on the environment possible.

We’ve had washable face masks made, stylists will use PVC aprons which we will sterilise (rather than throw away disposable ones), and refillable cleaning and sterilising product bottles have been ordered to avoid enormous waste, whilst keeping you safe.

Bookings, Payments and Rebookings

To remove the need for unnecessary queuing and congregating, we’ll be taking payments in the chair during or at the end of your visit with us. Our host team will come around with a tray with sterilised payment terminals. We recommend downloading and installing Apple Pay or Google Pay on your phone which will negate the need to touch the terminals. Initially, for the new rosters, we’ll only be opening the bookings up to 12 weeks ahead, until we know how challenging this is for the team, if it is sustainable for them and if it is necessary to comply with government guidelines.

For future colour appointments, please discuss these with your stylist during your appointment or whilst your colour is processing.

Thank you for making it this far, we appreciate this has been a big update!

We’re incredibly excited to see you soon and we look forward to welcoming you,

The Chapel Team