How To Be A Good Client - Don'ts

I believe that there are a lot of well intended people out there who make little mistakes with their massage therapists which prevent them from being “ideal” clients. Here I just wanted to highlight some really common situations that people put themselves in when going to/in session with their therapists and educate people who would like to be even more considerate clients than they already are:

1) Don’t be late. Occasionally this is understandable. I mean, we’re all human after all! However, if you find yourselves consistently being late then you need to schedule 30 minutes later than you would otherwise. This may possibly end up with you sitting on a couch for a few minutes but it really saves you time in your session, as well as preventing the therapist from feeling rushed in the massage.

2) Do not call one minute before your appointment time to reschedule half an hour later. This is enormously inconsiderate to the therapist’s time. Let me give you an example: One day I had a 9-4 shift. I had a massage from 2-3 pm, and then a blank spot from 3-4 pm. Since I had not gotten very many massages that day, I was next in line to get a booking (for the 3-4 pm time slot).

However, my consistently late client called at 1:59 and asked for a 2:30-3:30 appointment instead. Since it was empty the front desk was obligated to give that time to him. Five minutes later the front desk gets a call from one of my regulars requesting me for the 3-4 pm time slot. Obviously I did not get the booking because I was going to be in session with Mr. Late. I really resent that I lost money because of this guy that perpetually disrespects my time.   

3) Do not ask for more time at the very end of the massage as I am walking out of the door. I have no problem with a one-hour client deciding during the middle or beginning of the massage that they would really want a ninety-minute. The problem with asking me at the end of a massage is that if I find out that we don’t have enough rooms open or I have a client right afterwards then I just wasted like four minutes waiting on the (incredibly busy) front desk staff to give me the go ahead or not. When you only have ten minutes between clients this is not acceptable and definitely makes me late for my next client, whom I will now have to apologize to.

4) Do not take forever getting dressed. I really wished we had more time between clients so that clients could just take a few minutes to wake up, but the fact is that we don’t have that time. Within five minutes of taking our hands off the client at the very end of the massage we are supposed to have that room ready for the next person, sheets changed and everything. That leaves the client 3-4 minutes to get dressed which I believe is reasonable. The button-down suit clients take a little longer than that but that’s understandable.

What’s not understandable is when people (who have not accidentally fallen asleep) just lie on the table for five minutes as if they were snuggling into bed in their own homes. That is not okay because I might have three more clients in a row after that and will have to apologize to all of them for being late to their massages because of this one person. The utmost disrespect in this little bad manner division is when I am waiting outside the door with sheets and water for them and all of a sudden hear them carrying on a phone conversation in the room! And by disrespect I mean the extreme epitome of rudeness. That’s definitely when I knock on the door!

5) Do not moan excessively. It makes me feel uncomfortable when people do this because I don’t know them and I don’t know if they’re a sicko or not! When women are really verbal like this it’s just annoying, however when men do it it is super creepy. I had a guy once that sounded like a fourteen year old girl losing her virginity. It was disturbing. I asked him if he was alright every minute or so but unfortunately he did not get the hint.

6) Do not tense up during your massage. I understand that this is a natural bodily reaction and have no problem asking people to relax or jokingly say “play dead.” However, there are some people under the illusion that they are “helping” me. I put that in quotations because that is the word used by several of them. This matters because it makes the massage much more difficult for me when a person is contracting or tensing their muscles. For example, when a muscle is relaxed it feels like hard play-doh. When it's contracted it feels like…concrete. Please try not to “help”.

7) Do not be a “Negative Nancy”. It is very stressful to be in a small room with someone for an hour or more and have them bitch nonstop about their divorce. It sucks the energy and life right out of me and is really a downer. Also, people tense up when they talk about things that are stressing them so not only do I have to listen to them whine and unload this crap onto me, but it is also making my job harder.

            Well, those are the basic not-to-do’s and I’ll add some more in future posts as my blog comes along!