AIBU to worry about getting decent car seats in rental car at Faro airport?

[Snappyteabread]

We will be hiring a car at faro airport with a 6 year old and a 3 year old. Any tips on who to use and who to avoid ? My biggest concern is about making sure we have good quality high backed car seats and not some rubbish cheap booster seats. Please let me know your experiences and recommendations and tips. Am I being unreasonable to be worrying about this and I should just go with the flow?

[katand2kits]

You should take car seats with you. If you go with the flow, you will get some old seat out their back office. Most likely backless booster and super cheap nania seat. You will almost certainly not get decent quality. Most airlines allow you to take car seats for free in outsize baggage.

[SeashellHoarder]

Faro airport car rental pick up is well set up, a short walk from the terminal. who are you hiring with?
I never like hiring car seats though as they often come from a third party and not the case hire company itself. You have less come back if there's a problem.
Could you take your own car seats?

[katand2kits]

My experience is based on hiring a seat in pisa airport, and on seeing what was given out to others at Faro.

[SeashellHoarder]

Car hire company I mean!

[GogoGobo]

The car seats at Faro were not good - we only made that mistake once and actually borrowed one from our hotel for the return journey.
Always take our own now and would recommend you do too - they are free to take on flights I think.

[GinGinGin]

Take car seats with you. The one we got at a hire car in Geneva was awful - I dreaded dd being in the car in case there was an accident.

[lazyjournalistsbogoff]

The one we got at Faro was rubbish, not high backed for my very small 4 year old. I would take your own if possible.

[MsVestibule]

Definitely take your own. They're normally free to transport, but I would recommend you wrap them up well, or at least use packing tape to hold in place any moveable parts, e.g. the headrests, isofix anchors etc.

[Blankiefan]

We've used a company a couple of times for Portugal holidays called Little Rascals Algarve. They provide car seats, transfers, welcome packs, you hire and stuff similar. We've had them for transfers twice - each time they've also provided car seats which we've been happy with.

They seem to sub con the work out. Once the driver didn't know how to fit the car seat but we worked it out amongst us all.

I've found them to be pretty good and it was a good solution for us to the eternal car seat debate. I simply don't understand how this isn't an issue for more people. You'd never let your kids go on an hour long taxi ride in uk without one so how is it suddenly ok abroad? In baffled by the number of people I know who don't bother...

[Blankiefan]

I meant to say that the woman who runs it seems to be British ex pat which shouldn't make any difference but it did give me a bit of confidence that there wasn't an innate language barrier and that nothing for lost in translation...

[Snappyteabread]

Thank you Blankiefan. I actually just chanced upon that website and I think that might be a good option for us. I've emailed her tonight.

[HazzaB89]

I am in Portugal at the moment and hired a car last Thursday from Faro to get us to lagos. There are a few different rental companies BUT they on the whole all seem to be run by the same people. You go to the same desk no matter who you hired from (unless you go with a big company like europecar for example). We took our own car seat which is a £40 cheapo from kiddicare for our 20 month old but have ended up using the car seat the the hire company provided. Master kings I think it was. The seat looks absolutely fine & reclines which ours doesn't. Most airlines carry car seats for free however so maybe just take your own/buy a cheap one like we did.

[CottonSock]

Take them, even if you have to buy a cheap one. The only time I have had a decent seat in car hired abroad I had to pay a lot of money to book in advance. I decided not to bother again.

[CottonSock]

X post with hazza, who seems to have had better experience

[KatharinaRosalie]

I used Europcar at Faro and the car seat provided was very decent.

[Snappyteabread]

Just to update we booked car seats with Little rascals. Good service. They were patient with my many questions, and when I was eventually able to call them the lady was really helpful. Don't be put off by their basic website. I'm told they are looking to get it redone. I would definitely use them again. We also booked car rental through them, and the car seats were installed and waiting for us when we arrived. Had we booked sooner we would have had more of a choice of brands, but we left it a bit late, and were told that there had been a high demand this year. I put in a request for a particular brand in case it became available, and sure enough, when we arrived, it was there. The car rental company was Amoita. Car was great, and the guy who met us at the airport to handover the car really friendly and great service all round. Little rascals also do lots of other baby equipment which you can hire or have delivered to your accommodation. We are past the stage of needing any of that, but just wanted to share the info as it's always an issue when you are travelling and want to have all the stuff you normally have at home.if anyone has any questions about the service, let me know. I'm surprised more people don't use this kind of thing so happy to share my experience.

[Beeziekn33ze]

The power and support of Mumsnet in action! We had awful ones at Pisa too, took our own after that.

[Sedona123]

After booking a toddler car seat with Enterprise, and being given a booster seat instead (DS was 10 lbs too light to use one), we have never trusted car hire companies again. DS is now thankfully at the booster seat stage, and we bought an inflatable booster seat from Amazon called a Bubblebum (I think!). We still book a booster seat, but take the Bubblebum just in case.