Patch test, pigment batch, signed consent - before the first stroke.

Defaults a PMU artist should not have to look up

Starter PMU services land with a patch test (48 hours' lead, 6 months' validity) and signed consent on. Those are starting points. Your insurer and pigment supplier may want different numbers — change them on the category.

A top-up inside the window should not demand a new test if you have said it does not. A first stroke on a new client should not be bookable without one. That is the whole point of putting the rule on the category instead of in a caption on Instagram.

• Patch test as its own appointment, paired with the treatment if you want.
• Pigment batch on the visit.
• Consent signed before checkout.
• Brows, lips, eyeliner, top-up — edit the list.

Same product as the lash column

Plenty of PMU artists also do lashes or brows. Those categories keep their own test windows. You are not running a microblading app and a lash app.

One salon already runs piercings, nails, waxing, laser, facials, hair, tanning and tooth gems through Glow: 124 services across 12 categories, 17,000 bookings. Same product. Different menu.

See how long a patch test is valid and batch traceability.

Glow records what you set and shows when it was recorded. It does not decide what your insurer, council, pigment supplier or prescriber requires, and it does not claim a salon is compliant.

First stroke, top-up, and the gap between them

A first brow or lip is a long sitting with a test in front of it. A six-week top-up is a shorter one that should still see the pigment lot. A year-later refresh is a new conversation about the test window. If those three look the same in the diary, you will book them wrong. Glow starts them as different services so the public page cannot pretend a refresh is a 45-minute fill.

Pigment changes. So do needles. Put the lot on the visit even when the client is a regular who 'knows the drill'. Regulars are who you will be asked about. The consent they signed on the first stroke should still be findable when they come back; if your wording changed, they sign again.

Plenty of PMU artists also lift lashes or laminate brows. Those categories keep lash words and lash windows. You are one practitioner with one book, not three apps and a shared calendar that thinks everything is an hour.

Numbing, mapping and a long first sitting need a duration that is true. If the public page says 90 minutes and you always run three hours, you will hate the rest of the day. Publish the real time. Charge for it. A deposit that matches the length of the chair time is how those days hold.

Healed photos belong on the service, not only on Instagram. Clients booking a lip blush want to see lips, not a generic 'PMU' tile. Glow is still a booking page. Make it look like the work.

If you refuse a client because the test failed or the pigment is wrong for the skin, write that down. A refused sitting is still a record. The next artist in the building should not start from nothing because you were polite and booked them anyway. A failed test is a stop, not a shorter appointment. Do not 'just do a little' to be kind. Kind is a new test date and a clear no on the pigment until it passes. Write the no on the client so it survives a staff change. A new junior should not have to guess why last month's brow never happened. The no is part of the file, not a mood.

Price

£19 a month. Everything included. 0% commission. See Glow pricing.