Billing for your beauty parlour in Chandigarh
The threading stool, the festival package of five services and the colour tube with no count.
Tools for a parlour with a threading stool, a festival package and a shelf of colours
Bills on your phone
A threading as a bill of two seconds, so the coins in the saucer can be set against the number of women at the stool.
Offers for regular customers
A lower rate on threading for the woman who comes in before every festival, so the shop thanks her in the season she is busiest.
Credit book (khata)
A Karva Chauth booking taken a week ahead is noted under her name by the hands she wants, with what she has paid and what she owes, so the week's hands are known before the first cone is drawn.
Low stock warnings
Wax, mehndi cones and the cream clients ask about shown as they run low, before the festival week when every chair is booked.
From coins in a saucer to threadings counted, a package priced once and colour counted by the application
A threading is a bill of two seconds, and the night's count is the number of women
Make threading an item by the piece with its small rate. A bill takes two seconds to make, and the count at night is the number of threadings done, not the weight of the saucer. The woman at the stool is credited with what she did, and the owner can see the day's busiest hour.
The package as one item with its own rate, and the afternoons as dated bills on one page
Make the package an item with its rate, and put each afternoon on the client's page as a bill with the services that were done. On Thursday the page shows what she had on Tuesday and what is left. The owner is not asked to remember which of the five were done.
The bill sent to her husband's phone, and he pays by scanning the code at the door
Make the bill for the henna and send it to the number her husband gives. He reads it in the street, scans the QR code from where he stands and holds up his phone for the girl at the door to see. The client never has to touch anything, and the henna dries as it should.
Why the threading stool serves a dozen women an hour for coins, the festival package is five services at one price and wet henna cannot hold a phone
The threading stool, where a dozen women an hour pay in coins
At the front of the parlour a woman sits on a stool and threads eyebrows and upper lips for a few coins each. The women walk in from the sector market with a minute to spare, pay and leave, and the coins go into a saucer. At the end of the day the saucer is counted, and nobody knows how many threadings made up the sum. The festival afternoon is the one time of the year when the owner wishes she had counted.
The festival package that is five services at one price, taken over two afternoons
For the festival the parlour offers a package: threading, a facial, a hair spa, waxing and henna, at one price that is less than the five added together. A client takes some of it on Tuesday and the rest on Thursday. The owner has to remember which of the five she has had and what she paid, and the price of the package is only in her head.
The woman with wet henna on both hands, who cannot open her purse or her phone
A client sits with both hands freshly hennaed and held out like a tray, drying. She cannot open her purse, she cannot touch her phone, and she is not allowed to wipe her fingers. Her husband is in the street outside holding her bag, and the owner has to decide whether to ask her to wait or to send the girl out with a slip.
What a Chandigarh beauty parlour owner asks before starting
The woman at the threading stool is paid in coins all day. Can I count how many threadings she did?
Yes. Make threading an item by the piece. Each bill adds one, and the day's report shows how many were done and what they came to.
A client takes the festival package over two afternoons. How do I show what she has had and what is left?
Put each afternoon on her page as a bill with the services done. The page lists them by day, and the package's price less what she has paid is what is left.
A client has wet henna on both hands and cannot hold her phone. Can her husband pay from the street?
Yes. Make her bill while the paste is still drying, one line for each hand, and put it under the name of whoever will pay. She sits still until the henna is dry, and he settles it when she is ready to come out.
The Karva Chauth bookings are taken a week ahead. How do I know the cones will last the hands promised?
Count the cones as an item and add up the hands you have booked. If the hands are more than the cones will draw, the low-stock warning is already telling you what to order before the first booking is refused.
Henna by the hand on Karva Chauth, and the week the salons were full
On Karva Chauth 2016 tricity markets stayed busy till late evening, with henna appliers charging as much as Rs 500 per hand. For a parlour that has an artist at the back, that is the day on which the count of hands matters more than any other count in the year.
In October 2025 tricity salons and parlours reported full bookings for Karva Chauth, and bridal-level services such as airbrush make-up and gold facials were booked a week ahead. For a henna parlour the full book is then counted in hands: the number of hands the artists can draw is the number of cones to have ready.