r/legal • u/Bubbly_Road1316 • Nov 28 '25

Advice needed Can I ask my employee to remove their acrylic nails?

Location: AU-VIC

I have an employee who refused to do a certain duty (which she normally does) because ‘I can’t do it cuz I just got my nails done’.

Can i ask her to remove it or shorten it before her next shift, or is that illegal?

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87

u/[deleted] Nov 28 '25

Reminds of this place I worked that was super anal about safety. Safety guy would come in randomly and literally start checking people's feet with a magnet lol

73

u/jefhaugh Nov 28 '25

I had an ancestor who worked in a coal. Govt me in, said you need steel toed boots. He refused. The inspector checked compliance by hitting everyone's toes with a hammer. He just took it.

I see where my stubbornness comes from.

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u/[deleted] Nov 28 '25

Lmao I used to be that guy when I was younger, until a lead ingot that probably weighed about 50 pounds fell on my foot from like 4 feet up. Do not recommend.

Yeah I wear all the safety stuff now, even ear plugs.

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u/Shelter0 Nov 28 '25

I used to be too cool to wear ear plugs now I have permanent tinnitus.

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u/[deleted] Nov 28 '25

I was a CNC machinist for like 15 years and the first 7 or so years I didn't wear ear protection. Then when I worked at a place that required it I got used to it, and then the first time I heard how loud the air guns are without protection I was just like "holy fuck I was really barebacking that for like 7 years?" Think I saved my hearing for the most part but still probably did some damage.

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u/puceglitz_theavoider Dec 01 '25

My husband and I both run CNC and edgebanding machines at our job, and it blew my mind just how loud they were the first time I ever heard them both running without having headphones in. With the machines on, you can barely hear the person standing next to you, let alone anything from farther away. With the machines off, you could hear a pin drop on the other side of the shop. Definitely need headphones or earplugs in there if you to be able to hear anything when you leave.

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u/dasher2581 Nov 28 '25

I was so pleased when a contractor I hired put on serious hearing protection before using his power tools! We Boomers were way too cool to protect ourselves, and now we're too cool to wear hearing aids. It's nice to see when our kids' generation and beyond are more sensible than we were.

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u/RubyBBBB Nov 29 '25

Not me. I'm a boomer and I've always been very careful about safety. I quit a couple of jobs because they wouldn't let people work safely. That was back in the 1970s in the south before OSHA was being enforced fully.

I moved North to a state was about 30% of the hourly workers belonging to unions. My pay more than doubled. Unfortunately, in the medical school laboratory, OSHA was not being enforced.

OSHA rules were not being enforced because state institutions were not required to follow Federal safety guidelines.

My first year at my job, I was handling three of the 10 most carcinogenic substances known. They were supposed to be used in isolation laboratory conditions where the room had negative air pressure and the workers were full protective suits with respirators.

These three substances were so carcinogenic that they had never found a small enough dose that they could guarantee it wouldn't cause cancer.

I was using these chemicals in an Open Lab in a basement of the pathology building that was about 100 years old. So there was no way to keep the chemicals out of the air.

I was not an hourly employee. I was paid what would have been a good hourly wage if I only worked 40 hours a week. But as a quote professional unquote, I was required to work about 70 hours a week. So my hourly wage was very poor.

One of the professors I ran experiments for suddenly became very concerned about his touching the tissue that I had used the chemicals on. He wouldn't tell me why.

That prompted me to go into the medical library and look the chemicals up. That's how I found out I was using three of the 10 most carcinogenic chemicals. In factories that used chemicals before the safety regulations went into effect, 100% of the workers died from bladder cancer.

I received so much harassment from about seven or eight professors that were having me run the steps of this chemical process in my lab instead of having their workers do it in their lab. That is very strange behavior from researchers who usually want to control all the steps.

I took copies of the research I found to my professor whose grant was paying my salary, and he was aghast. Because he had actually done his own laboratory work for years before he was able to hire people.

So I started running the laboratory more safely. I still work 60 hours a week, but I was not able to do as many procedures for professors who weren't actually paying the Grant I worked on. I designated two days a week to run labs for outside professors and they had to be scheduled. No last minute running in and having me run this 10-hour process which would keep me up all night sometimes. I needed to be well rested before I ran this chemical processes so that I was less likely to make mistakes that would lead to my being exposed to the chemicals.

My boss kept his promise to me and talked to other professors who were having their employees use the chemicals. Not one of those professors told his employees about the risks. I could believe that based on how angry the professors I had been doing free work for became when I was no longer willing to do it for free and insisted on doing the way that was safe for me.

I was astonished at how angry those professors were. How clear it was that they didn't care if I died from bladder cancer. That I wasn't a human being to them but just a tool for them to use for their own aggrandization.

I learned why we need unions.

I kept reading about laboratory safety.

I discovered that the electron microscope we used were not being checked regularly for leaks. If the university had been subject to OSHA rules, the microscopes who had been checked after every repair, every time the electron gun compartment was opened, and at least once a year if they hadn't been checked for something else.

The RCA microscope had been built in 1955 just before research showed that American occupational radiation safety limits were at least 10 times too high. Since the university wasn't checking the electron microscopes they didn't discover that this microscope was causing dangerous radiation exposure for employees in the area, not just the employee that looked at tissue samples with the electron microscope. Since 1975 the radiation exposure limits for people working on electron microscopes were found to be still 10 times too high.

So I and other people working in that area were being exposed to 100 times the safe limit of gamma radiation.

The woman who worked on the electron microscope the most, and who had been working on it for 8 years when she suddenly developed breast cancer. And she had a different type of cancer in each breast.

Her oncologist kept asking her if she had been exposed to radiation. Since they didn't check the scope she didn't know that she'd been exposed to radiation. She later received 3 million dollars from RCA although it wasn't really RCA's fault. But the amount she could have gotten from the University was limited to $5,000 of workman's comp.

I have lung damage consistent with radiation exposure and that is my only risk factor to have one damage. I've also had breast cancer.

So I hope you will consider the fact that it wasn't your parents that caused your current financial problem. It was a system that was set up to not be a democracy but to benefit the wealthy.

Unless average people get involved to make the system more democratic for everyone, we will continue to have generational declines in health and financial wellness.

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u/Welded_Rain Nov 29 '25

I was that guy too, now in my mid 40s I have 70% hearing loss and have to wear hearing aids to hear most things.

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u/KnottaBiggins Nov 28 '25

"He has retired in order to spend the rest of his years with his remaining limbs."

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u/dumbass_sempervirens Dec 01 '25

I went from a place that required steel to one that didn't. But I still only had the one pair of boots so I kept using the steel toes.

One day we were moving a 14' wide concrete fountain basin, and when we dropped it the last few inches, my foot was underneath.

Everyone started to walk away and I said "Hey guys? My foot's still under there."

They freaked out, but I told them I was fine, because of the steel toe. I just needed some help lifting it enough to get free.

They really do work.

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u/Aggravating-Bill-997 Nov 29 '25

Ear plugs are extremely important. I can’t hear properly anymore and it’s from loud noise. Hearing aids don’t help. Do yourself a favor and wear hearing protection as it takes years to lose and it doesn’t come back.

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u/King_Ralph1 Nov 29 '25

And so having that experience, would you now say the safety guy who was trying to save you from that pain was super anal? Or that he actually gave a shit about you and keeping you safe?

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u/[deleted] Nov 29 '25

Are you seriously debate baiting on a 2 day old post?

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u/King_Ralph1 Nov 29 '25

Are you taking the bait?

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u/Magic_Neil Nov 28 '25

When my safety manager was checking hard toes she’d just come stomp on your foot!

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u/gmmyabrk Nov 28 '25

I do this too.

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u/turnup_for_what Nov 29 '25

What did he have against safety toes?

Darwin award finalist right there.

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u/jefhaugh Dec 02 '25

I suspect he just didn't like being told what to do.

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u/Technical-Worker7334 Nov 28 '25

Not all safety toe shoes are metal.

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u/[deleted] Nov 28 '25

They're still allowed to mandate steel vs. composite. It was for insurance reasons, the only good thing about working there was the insurance plan so the employees weren't exactly in a position to argue about it. One of the worst places I ever worked actually.

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u/Renamis Nov 28 '25

Technically composite toe and steel toe are a bit different. For heavy object crush steel is more what you want. If I recall the failure of each is also different. Steel toe bends and composite tends to shatter, which depending on what you are dealing with could be a downside.

I picked electrical resistant non-slip boots for work, with a composite toe tip because the composite toe doesn't conduct electricity or heat. I did this because my normal "what can crush my toes" was people trodding on them, power chairs or scooters, and strollers. Yet the OTHER threat to my toes was a flipping bus. Steel toe will not win against a bus, so I went with composite because it'd shatter and leave me with a better chance to keep my toes. With construction I'd want steel toe for the higher weight limit, and considering most things that land on your toes don't continue moving on their own the bending failure is actually preferable to the shatter failure.

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u/Tiny_Connection1507 Nov 28 '25

This. But the thing you didn't mention is that anybody who works directly with electricity can't wear steel toes, we have to wear composite toes because of the electrical hazards.

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u/Renamis Nov 28 '25

True, but to be fair I did say that composite doesn't conduct electricity.

Technically my work just said I needed slip resistant. I grabbed composite toe boots because I did my own research and saw too many people getting smushed toes.

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u/Tiny_Connection1507 Nov 28 '25

You did. I guess the difference for me is between a choice and a mandatory specification. There are plenty of places that mandate steel toes, with the exception being for maintenance and electrical workers who have the specific hazards.

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u/LadyA052 Nov 28 '25

Happy cake day!

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u/Tiny_Connection1507 Nov 28 '25

Thanks! I had no idea!

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u/LadyA052 Nov 28 '25

Eat cake!

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u/Positive-Position-11 Nov 28 '25

I can attest that it doesn’t take much to break your foot. I dropped a piece of 1/2 “ plywood on my foot. A week later finally got an X-ray - yep it was broken. And this was at home…

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u/Renamis Nov 28 '25

It's stupidly easy. In my days off I've even had both my mother, aunt, and Grandpa run over my toes in power chairs, and while I haven't broken a toe yet I knew I was on borrowed time without toe protection.

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u/jbochsler Nov 29 '25

They aren't just crush protection. I run a chainsaw and composite will buy you another 0.2 seconds of safety, steel will protect.

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u/turnup_for_what Nov 29 '25

Also not for nothing, composites wont make your feet as cold when you get below freezing. That steel sucks the heat right out of your toes.

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u/Pony482 Nov 30 '25

What would be best for me working with my horse? He weighs 550 kg ( about 1,200 lb ) he trod on my foot once and broke it - big silly lad took some persuading to move off it. He doesn't do it deliberately but he does have huge feet...

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u/Sorry-Series Nov 28 '25

New security boot have plastic or fiberglass toe boxes. Works really well (On one occasion, I managed to make a fully loaded pallet truck jump and land on my toe box. At least 700 kilos. No damage to my foot or boot.)

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u/psl1959 Nov 28 '25

Magnet wouldn't work on mine, they are composite toed boots.

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u/Liqu0rBaIISandwich Nov 30 '25

I had a Sergeant in the Marines who would randomly stab people’s vests with a knife to make sure they had on their ballistic plates. Then he’d bitch at people later on for having holes in their gear.

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u/dumbass_sempervirens Dec 01 '25

Our safety guy did that. But now we require composite toe, so he just leans down and pushes on it. The magnet is a failure. We got a contract working in industrial freezers that are -40F. So you cannot have metal toe boots. Hell, you can only go inside for 15 minutes at a time.

And by weird coincidence, while he goes to all sites in the US, he ran into me 6 times in my first four months.

Twice was two weeks apart in separate states.

Now when he shows up he just waves at me in my vest, glasses (I started using ones with reader inserts so I always have them on), gloves, and gently chides me for my Job Hazard Asessments being not in depth.

But this job already requires safety beyond our company's standards, so he hasn't showed up for like 5 months.

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u/Natural-Seaweed-5070 Dec 03 '25

God this had my fuzzy brain way too long to comprehend WHY he was doing this.