The work is finished, it looks good, and you take a photo. She smiles and says of course. Two years later a message arrives asking you to take it down, and you discover that "of course" covered less than you assumed.
The usual advice is to get consent, which is true and almost useless, because it treats one word as though it covered one thing. In practice you are asking for three different permissions, and people say yes to the first while only half-hearing the others.
Three permissions, not one
| Permission | What she is agreeing to | When it usually goes wrong |
|---|---|---|
| To be photographed | A picture being taken, here, now | Almost never |
| To be published | It appearing publicly, indefinitely | Constantly |
| To be kept | You holding it after the visit | Quietly, in the background |
Someone nodding at a camera in a treatment room is answering the first question. Whether the picture goes on a public profile with your location attached, and whether it stays there when she stops being your client, are separate questions that were never put to her.
Which is why "she agreed at the time" collapses so easily. She did agree — to something narrower than what happened.
Some photos are not ordinary pictures
A second thing gets flattened: photographs of work are treated as one category, when a portion of them carry information about someone’s body that the rules treat separately.
A "before" photograph very often exists precisely because it shows a condition — damage, a reaction, an infection, a skin problem you were correcting. That is the entire reason the picture is interesting, and it is also what makes it more than a snapshot of a hand.
- A "before" carries more than an "after", almost by definition. Treat the pair as two different objects rather than one post.
- Identifiability is not only faces. A tattoo, a ring, a birthmark, a distinctive nail shape, or a caption naming the treatment and the town can be enough.
- A photo kept for your own records is a different purpose from one used for marketing. Same file, two purposes, and they do not automatically travel together.
- If you work in the UK or the EU this is a live obligation, and the regulator publishes guidance written for people with no legal department.
Asking so that the answer is worth something
The awkwardness people feel here is real, and it comes from asking at the wrong moment in the wrong words. Both are fixable.
- Ask before, not afterRaised at booking or during the consultation it is administrative. Raised with the camera already in your hand it is a favour, and people agree to favours they would rather decline.
- Name where it goes"On my page and my price list" is a question she can actually answer. "For my portfolio" means nothing specific and is where the misunderstanding starts.
- Offer the narrower option out loudHands only, no face, no location. Most people say yes to the narrower version immediately, and the narrower version is usually the better photograph anyway.
- Say she can change her mindCounter-intuitive and it increases the yes rate, because agreeing stops feeling permanent. It is also the honest position, since she can.
- Record the answer with the workA dated line against the client: what she agreed to and for what. Which is exactly what the rest of the record is for.
That last point is why this belongs with the notes rather than in a separate folder — the record you keep between visits is where the answer stays findable two years later, when the question is no longer fresh in anyone’s memory.
When she changes her mind
This is the scenario worth having thought about once in advance, because it always arrives without warning and usually at a bad moment.
Someone who agreed two years ago may have separated, changed job, changed how she wants to be seen, or simply had enough. She does not need a reason, and asking for one converts an easy interaction into a bad one.
- Take it down, promptly and without negotiating. The cost to you is one post; the cost of arguing is the whole relationship and whatever she says about it.
- Check where else it went — a highlight, a pinned post, a price list, a printed card, a third-party profile. Removing one copy while four remain reads as refusal.
- Say when it is done. A short confirmation ends the matter.
- Note it, so you do not reuse the picture in a year having forgotten.
- Do not ask her to reconsider. It is her image, and treating the request as negotiable is what turns this into a story.
Where the photographs actually live
- A phone gallery that syncs to a shared family account is not storage for other people’s medical-adjacent pictures. This is the single most common gap and the easiest to close.
- Decide how long you keep them. Indefinitely is a decision nobody made — it is what happens when nobody decides.
- Keep marketing images separate from record images, because they answer to different permissions and have different lifespans.
- If someone else posts on your behalf, they need to know what was agreed. Consent does not transfer with the file.
None of this makes photography harder in practice. Asked properly at booking, the whole thing costs one sentence — and it converts your best marketing asset from something borrowed into something you are entitled to use.
Do I need something written, or is a verbal yes enough?
What matters is being able to show what was agreed and when, which a dated line in the client record does perfectly well for ordinary work. Where the image shows a condition rather than a result, something explicit is worth having, and adding a line to the consultation form is easier than remembering to ask.
What about photos where you cannot see her face?
Better, and often enough — but identifiability is broader than faces, so a distinctive tattoo, ring or birthmark plus a caption naming the treatment and town can still identify someone locally. Cropping helps; it is not a blanket exemption.
She agreed years ago. Do I need to ask again?
For continuing to use something already agreed, generally not — but if you want to use it somewhere new, that is a new purpose and worth a new question. It is also the moment to check that your record actually says what she agreed to, rather than relying on your memory of a conversation.
A client asks me to delete everything, not just a photo.
Take it seriously and act on it rather than filing it, and be aware that some records may need keeping for other reasons — insurance and treatment history among them. Say what you are deleting and what you are retaining and why; a clear answer usually resolves it, and the regulator publishes plain guidance if it does not.
Can I post a client’s photo if I paid her or gave the treatment free?
Payment buys her time, not her image, so the same three permissions apply and should be agreed the same way. If anything, write it down more carefully here, because a model or trade arrangement is exactly where both sides later remember the terms differently.