I have this issue with MUA Racquel Lacson of Studio26..
She was the only one vendor not available for our rescheduled date in August 2021..
She refuses to refund the deposit & was quite condescending in mentioning that she is doing me a favour by not charging me her full fee as per her contract (she dismisses the fact that the contract is void due to COVID-19)
I will never recommend her to anybody! Overpriced and Overhyped for no good reason
*This post is related to pre-Covid 19 circumstances. However, I was extremely disappointed with the company’s refund/cancellation policy and inability to accommodate and work out a reasonable solution. Definitely WOULD NOT recommend booking Studio 26 for future brides, especially given the current situation and uncertainty of the upcoming year.
I booked Studio 26 Racquel Lacson in August 2019 for my wedding in 2021, and due to personal reasons, had to cancel my booking and inquired about new potential dates earlier this year in January so that I can reschedule/transfer the bookings to new dates. The dates she had available did not work with majority of my other vendors/venues, therefore I proceeded to confirm cancellation of my original bookings. An advance notice of at least 1 year and 4 months was provided from my end regarding cancellation to allow the company to easily rebook a new client for the original long weekend dates.
She refused to offer any refund of my deposit (50% of the total amount), and stated via email that “despite the early notice, the chances of your original long weekend dates getting rebooked are very slim, so it will be an equal loss for you and the company.” She also proceeded to inform me that in addition to the deposit being completely non-refundable, it was also NON-TRANSFERRABLE, which means that even if I was to rebook her for a new date, I would have to pay the ENTIRE deposit again. I was absolutely not satisfied with the company’s inability to problem solve or offer any type of reasonable solution and therefore ended up booking with another makeup artist instead.
I would like to mention that other vendors/venues we had booked were extremely understanding and flexible with moving the dates, and also offered FULL-REFUNDS. This included Nav Dhillon from INav Photography as well as Pinder from Studio 101 Productions; both vendors were very accommodating and were able to either transfer the dates or completely refund the deposits with amazing professionalism and communication. This brought to my attention that these vendors were also allotting an entire week to work with only one couple, and put in numerous hours throughout the year as well to edit videos and photos. Despite the fact that the total payments for their work are far larger then Studio 26, we did not face a single issue or concern from their ends, or any complaints about “losing out on bookings and facing difficulties to rebook since it is a long weekend.” Although they will also be opening the dates again for new bookings, they put the client’s best interests ahead of their own and prioritized client satisfaction, unlike Studio 26 who would prefer to keep the entire deposits when absolutely no service of any kind was provided to the client and plenty of advance notice was given.
After this horrible personal experience with Studio 26 Racquel Lacson, I would NEVER recommend her to future brides, especially given that wedding planning and scheduling can be unpredictable. She was not willing to emphasize or work with the clients’ interests in mind, and caused an unnecessary immense amount of stress for myself.
My sister was booked with Racquel for her bridal hair and makeup. Cant speak on her hair and makeup skill as the service was not completed. I’m sure she is good otherwise my sister wouldn’t have booked her. The review I am giving is her general customer service experience. Racquel cancelled on my sister one week before her wedding. She was booked for both wedding and reception. Due to covid the wedding was rescheduled a number of times. Racquel moved the booking for us each time which we were thankful for. The final time we rescheduled Racquel was not available for the wedding day. However she was adament that she was. She was asking my sister to pretty much get ready at midnight the day before her wedding. She made my sister feel like shit making it seem like she was being the problem. Logically it doesn’t make sense for a bride to be ready for her wedding 7 hrs before the photo/video crew comes and 10 hrs before the actual ceramony. Nevertheless my sister decided to try and find an alternative wedding day artist and stuck with Racquel for just her reception so our deposit didn’t go to waste. Since she was booked for two events intially you would think that since now she was only doing only one event (half the work) the invoice would also be cut in half. But Racquel actully added close to $900 to the invoice. Being stuck between a rock and hard place my sister agreed. As you can imagine planning a wedding and replanning a wedding short notice again due to covid is very stressfull so somethings fall between the cracks and you miss things. For the amount of money your paying you would imagine this would be a premium experience. Racquel uses an online portal to communicate with her brides which is not a problem normally but you have to login to see if you have recieved any correspondence from her. My sister forgot to check the portal and missed the reminder. In the stress of the wedding we had forgotten to pay ONE installment of the balance. Keep in mind a deposit had been paid, trial dates had been set so from our end we were fulfilling everything to make this a legitimate booking. There is SO many vendors used in a wedding and everyone has their own payment plans. But I feel like a common courtesy is if one method of contact hasn’t worked you would try another. Call, text, regular email. But none of those were used Racquel cancelled my sisters trial and reception 1 week prior to her wedding. She didn’t even call to tell us she was going to cancel and she had canceled. Luckily my sister logged in to the portal the Sat before her Tues trial and saw everything was cancelled. She attempted to contact Racquel numerous times saying she can pay right away if her dates will be reinstated. As far as I know Racquel did not reply back. Thankfully my sisters new wedding makeup vendor was also able to squeeze in a reception look.
Did we make some mistakes? Yes. Did we lose our $1500 deposit? Yes. Was Racquel 100% at fault? Not entirely as we did miss a payment date.
Was the customer service experience total trash? 1 Million% . What vendor will cancel on a bride 1 week before her wedding without warning or trying alternative forms of contact.
Racquel may have some special makeup skill but in my opinion she is not worth the stress and shit experience you get put through just to look good. There are so many different vendors that can do work at par with her. You don’t want this kind of negative energy around you on whats supposed to be ” The happiest day of you life”
Raquel was beyond exceptional. As someone who does not wear make up regularly Raquel made sure that I felt comfortable and still looked like myself. I had her from my sangeet, wedding, reception, and milni day, and she slayed all of my looks and made sure they were all different. Raquel even stayed behind on my reception pre-shoots as it was very windy and she wanted to make sure my hair looked its best before I entered my reception. Through the week Raquel become more of a friend than just my HMUA, I could not recommend her enough; there’s a reason she’s been in the game for 18+ years.
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Preet
April 16, 2020 at 6:45 pmI have this issue with MUA Racquel Lacson of Studio26..
She was the only one vendor not available for our rescheduled date in August 2021..
She refuses to refund the deposit & was quite condescending in mentioning that she is doing me a favour by not charging me her full fee as per her contract (she dismisses the fact that the contract is void due to COVID-19)
I will never recommend her to anybody! Overpriced and Overhyped for no good reason
Jasmine
April 20, 2020 at 8:41 pm*This post is related to pre-Covid 19 circumstances. However, I was extremely disappointed with the company’s refund/cancellation policy and inability to accommodate and work out a reasonable solution. Definitely WOULD NOT recommend booking Studio 26 for future brides, especially given the current situation and uncertainty of the upcoming year.
I booked Studio 26 Racquel Lacson in August 2019 for my wedding in 2021, and due to personal reasons, had to cancel my booking and inquired about new potential dates earlier this year in January so that I can reschedule/transfer the bookings to new dates. The dates she had available did not work with majority of my other vendors/venues, therefore I proceeded to confirm cancellation of my original bookings. An advance notice of at least 1 year and 4 months was provided from my end regarding cancellation to allow the company to easily rebook a new client for the original long weekend dates.
She refused to offer any refund of my deposit (50% of the total amount), and stated via email that “despite the early notice, the chances of your original long weekend dates getting rebooked are very slim, so it will be an equal loss for you and the company.” She also proceeded to inform me that in addition to the deposit being completely non-refundable, it was also NON-TRANSFERRABLE, which means that even if I was to rebook her for a new date, I would have to pay the ENTIRE deposit again. I was absolutely not satisfied with the company’s inability to problem solve or offer any type of reasonable solution and therefore ended up booking with another makeup artist instead.
I would like to mention that other vendors/venues we had booked were extremely understanding and flexible with moving the dates, and also offered FULL-REFUNDS. This included Nav Dhillon from INav Photography as well as Pinder from Studio 101 Productions; both vendors were very accommodating and were able to either transfer the dates or completely refund the deposits with amazing professionalism and communication. This brought to my attention that these vendors were also allotting an entire week to work with only one couple, and put in numerous hours throughout the year as well to edit videos and photos. Despite the fact that the total payments for their work are far larger then Studio 26, we did not face a single issue or concern from their ends, or any complaints about “losing out on bookings and facing difficulties to rebook since it is a long weekend.” Although they will also be opening the dates again for new bookings, they put the client’s best interests ahead of their own and prioritized client satisfaction, unlike Studio 26 who would prefer to keep the entire deposits when absolutely no service of any kind was provided to the client and plenty of advance notice was given.
After this horrible personal experience with Studio 26 Racquel Lacson, I would NEVER recommend her to future brides, especially given that wedding planning and scheduling can be unpredictable. She was not willing to emphasize or work with the clients’ interests in mind, and caused an unnecessary immense amount of stress for myself.
Dapinder
December 1, 2021 at 7:32 pmMy sister was booked with Racquel for her bridal hair and makeup. Cant speak on her hair and makeup skill as the service was not completed. I’m sure she is good otherwise my sister wouldn’t have booked her. The review I am giving is her general customer service experience. Racquel cancelled on my sister one week before her wedding. She was booked for both wedding and reception. Due to covid the wedding was rescheduled a number of times. Racquel moved the booking for us each time which we were thankful for. The final time we rescheduled Racquel was not available for the wedding day. However she was adament that she was. She was asking my sister to pretty much get ready at midnight the day before her wedding. She made my sister feel like shit making it seem like she was being the problem. Logically it doesn’t make sense for a bride to be ready for her wedding 7 hrs before the photo/video crew comes and 10 hrs before the actual ceramony. Nevertheless my sister decided to try and find an alternative wedding day artist and stuck with Racquel for just her reception so our deposit didn’t go to waste. Since she was booked for two events intially you would think that since now she was only doing only one event (half the work) the invoice would also be cut in half. But Racquel actully added close to $900 to the invoice. Being stuck between a rock and hard place my sister agreed. As you can imagine planning a wedding and replanning a wedding short notice again due to covid is very stressfull so somethings fall between the cracks and you miss things. For the amount of money your paying you would imagine this would be a premium experience. Racquel uses an online portal to communicate with her brides which is not a problem normally but you have to login to see if you have recieved any correspondence from her. My sister forgot to check the portal and missed the reminder. In the stress of the wedding we had forgotten to pay ONE installment of the balance. Keep in mind a deposit had been paid, trial dates had been set so from our end we were fulfilling everything to make this a legitimate booking. There is SO many vendors used in a wedding and everyone has their own payment plans. But I feel like a common courtesy is if one method of contact hasn’t worked you would try another. Call, text, regular email. But none of those were used Racquel cancelled my sisters trial and reception 1 week prior to her wedding. She didn’t even call to tell us she was going to cancel and she had canceled. Luckily my sister logged in to the portal the Sat before her Tues trial and saw everything was cancelled. She attempted to contact Racquel numerous times saying she can pay right away if her dates will be reinstated. As far as I know Racquel did not reply back. Thankfully my sisters new wedding makeup vendor was also able to squeeze in a reception look.
Did we make some mistakes? Yes. Did we lose our $1500 deposit? Yes. Was Racquel 100% at fault? Not entirely as we did miss a payment date.
Was the customer service experience total trash? 1 Million% . What vendor will cancel on a bride 1 week before her wedding without warning or trying alternative forms of contact.
Racquel may have some special makeup skill but in my opinion she is not worth the stress and shit experience you get put through just to look good. There are so many different vendors that can do work at par with her. You don’t want this kind of negative energy around you on whats supposed to be ” The happiest day of you life”
Karen
February 7, 2023 at 8:49 pmRaquel was beyond exceptional. As someone who does not wear make up regularly Raquel made sure that I felt comfortable and still looked like myself. I had her from my sangeet, wedding, reception, and milni day, and she slayed all of my looks and made sure they were all different. Raquel even stayed behind on my reception pre-shoots as it was very windy and she wanted to make sure my hair looked its best before I entered my reception. Through the week Raquel become more of a friend than just my HMUA, I could not recommend her enough; there’s a reason she’s been in the game for 18+ years.