Can I treat a client with ringworm, impetigo or scabies?

No. All three are contagious, and all three are absolute contraindications for hands-on treatment — massage, waxing, facials, body treatments, manicures and pedicures included.

Quick recognition guide:

• Ringworm (tinea): a fungal infection, not a worm. Red, scaly ring with a clearer centre, often itchy. Spreads by skin contact and via towels, couch covers and tools.
• Impetigo: bacterial (staph or strep). Golden-yellow crusts, often around the nose, mouth or limbs. Highly contagious until 48 hours after antibiotics start, or until lesions crust over and heal.
• Scabies: mites burrowing under the skin. Intense itching, worse at night, with thin grey lines or a pimple-like rash between fingers, on wrists and waist. Spreads through prolonged skin contact — exactly what a massage is.

What to do when you spot one mid-consultation:

• Stop before contact. Politely explain the area looks like an infection that needs a pharmacist or GP first.
• Reschedule, don't work around it. Localised ringworm on a leg still rules out that leg wax — your hands, wax sticks and couch bridge the gap to your next client.
• Disinfect everything the client touched, and launder towels and covers at 60°C.
• Record it: what you saw, the date, and that you rescheduled. That note is your insurance defence if a later client claims they caught something in your salon.