Virginia Spa, School, Instructor, Records, and Discipline Rules

Individual qualification and licensed premises

A practitioner's individual license does not replace a required business license. DPOR states that a business offering master-esthetics services needs an esthetics spa license, including when those services are located in a cosmetology salon. Verify the actual entity, location, service, and responsible management rather than assuming that an existing salon license covers every advanced service.

Section 80 makes spa licenses nontransferable and sets reporting and new-license requirements when an entity changes. Name, address, principal place of business, and responsible-management changes need the applicable reports. When the licensed legal entity is dissolved or altered into a new entity, the original license becomes void; notify the Board, apply within the specified thirty-day period, and follow the rule's destruction requirement. A sale agreement does not itself transfer the license.

Responsible management must ensure that staff have the required individual authority. The rule recognizes registered apprentices and temporary-license arrangements under their proper conditions; an unlicensed employee is not authorized simply because a master esthetician is nearby. Supervision requirements and allowed roles must be verified separately.

Schools, locations, and instructors

Section 90 governs school licensing. An application must be submitted at least sixty days before the proposed opening approval date. A school license is also nontransferable. Signs and advertisements must identify the licensed educational institution. The Board or its agents must be allowed to inspect during reasonable hours.

For school locations, the definitions and curriculum rules distinguish facilities under one roof and within five hundred feet of the main office from separate locations. Practical training has approved facility requirements even where some theory instruction may be online. A school performing paid public services must have the appropriate spa authority; approval to teach does not erase service-facility requirements.

Certified instructors need the relevant current license and the qualifications specified in section 100, including the listed teaching-course or examination route. A student-instructor temporary permit under section 105 is a limited twelve-month arrangement requiring the specified supervision; it is not an unrestricted instructor certificate. Check status before assigning independent teaching duties.

Student records and reporting

Section 230 requires schools to keep specified student records on the premises throughout enrollment and for five years after completion, termination, or withdrawal. Records include the signed enrollment application and photograph, attendance, clock hours and calculation method, practical performance sheets, final transcript, course descriptions, and other relevant accrued-training documents.

The school must produce requested records to the Board within ten days, subject to the extension provision for extenuating circumstances. A student's written request for hours and performances must be answered within twenty-one days. Before closure or ownership change, current students must receive documentation of completed hours and performances. These rules concern school training records; do not invent a matching legal retention period for every spa client chart.

Section 240 requires quarterly student rosters by January 15, April 15, July 15, and October 15, including specified enrolled and recent students. A school with no current students but intending to operate must still report that circumstance. False training totals or unjustified transfer credit are not minor clerical shortcuts.

Display, inspection, and contact changes

Section 260 requires current licenses and certificates to be displayed for public inspection in the reception area or at individual workstations. Multiple practice locations require the specified duplicate display arrangements. Do not assume that the statute requires a portrait photo on every displayed individual license merely because a school enrollment record requires a photo.

Allow the Board's inspection during reasonable hours, defined in the chapter with an adjustment for businesses not substantially open during the usual nine-to-five period. Produce requested records and respond accurately to inquiries. Refusing access, providing misleading information, or concealing documents can independently create disciplinary grounds.

Notify the Board in writing within thirty days of a name or address change for each license, certificate, or temporary license. Do not confuse that reporting duty under section 280 with section 140's expiration rule. Failure to receive a notice because an address was not updated does not excuse renewal obligations.

Grounds and sanctions

Other specified grounds include failure to report final or disciplinary action from another jurisdiction within thirty days and specified felony-related events within thirty days. Read the exact current provisions and disclosure requirements; do not assume every unrelated misdemeanor is covered by the same wording.

The Board may deny issuance, renewal, or reinstatement, impose a monetary penalty, order probation, suspend, or revoke after considering the circumstances under the rule. Do not invent an automatic immediate suspension or fixed fine for every lapse. A corrective response should stop unsafe practice, protect clients, make required reports, preserve accurate records, and restore lawful conditions. Documentation must describe what happened; changing a record to hide a violation adds another problem rather than resolving it.

Sources and current rules

Current school and discipline chapter; DPOR facility guidance. Checked October 7, 2026.