Car seats - who chooses?

[cocomelonhead]

Parents have one car seat which they bought for our eldest child a few years ago. They asked us which one and we told them and they bought it. We now have 2 children. They've been borrowing one of our car seats whenever they take them both but now they've said they've bought their own second seat. Only thing is, I don't like the seat they've bought. It's a re-brand of a cheap generic Chinese seat and it's not properly crash tested to the same standard as our other seats. I don't want my kids in it. Am I ok in telling them that? Or seeing as it's their car and they paid should I just suck it up. For information, because I know it'll be asked, they have the children because they want to, not as regular childcare, so we don't need them to have them.

And Which carries out its own testing which exceeds minimum regs too.

'The results of our faster-than-the-regulations crash tests reveal big differences between car seats. Some protect babies and children well, but others expose them to the risk of serious injury or even death.'

This doesn't avoid drama. Taking away a seat they regard as perfectly safe is intrinsically dramatic.

Ok...so how many "faster than regulations" crashes have occurred with these lower standard seats which have resulted in kids dying?

It's like me saying. Well, I wear TWO life vests, because the regs are too low as they only use 1 in their tests.

@Hugasauras
I found this link from Which. The seats they don’t recommend, despite them all meeting the legal safety standards, are not always the cheap ones. Some of the more expensive ones fail their more rigorous standards.

Oops, forgot the link!
www.which.co.uk/reviews/child-car-seats?LP=TEST&source_code=317AAJ&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIr869yLzl-gIVs2DmCh3PjAguEAAYASAAEgIt2fD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds&page=3

We always buy grandparents/family the car seat - sorry to be harsh but you probably should have bought them a car seat earlier if you were going to be particular about it

I don't think I mentioned price at all! The fact is that some seats are safer than others and there are some poor seats on the market that just scrape though low testing regulations and no more and I choose not to put my children in them and I don't blame OP for not wanting to either. I don't care if other people want to use those seats (although I think minimum regulations should be higher and also rearfacing mandatory for longer, but under current rules it's not my business what other people do).

As for how many children have died in different makes of seats, I don't have that information, but I don't want my child to die so I pick the best seat I can afford

I think ask them why they don't want to keep using your one. If they just thought it was easier then buy them another one

All car seats (sold through shops, reputable websites) have to meet standards, unless it's been bought off the back of a lorry it's not unsafe.

Those of us with children who are grown had them front facing from 15 months and in boosters from 4, whilst rear facing is safer in some circumstances (not all, read an interesting report!) The difference is quite small. My dd was in a motorway collision at 2 in a forward facing seat, was absolutely fine, and the police said her properly installed seat was the reason. Note properly installed, it's was a basic graco seat by today's standards no isofix

Your child is safe in a "minimum standard" car seat.

Spending more money isn't a guarantee of safety.

You could buy a £4000 car seat,and if it's not fitted correctly,it not safer than the £65 one from Argos.

Buy one you prefer then?

It's all well and good saying they meet the minimum standards, but what if you crash at 40mph and the seat just snaps and your child is harmed. Why would you not choose the seat that is tested at higher speeds?

Anyway, I didn't mean for this to turn in to a debate about car seat safety. I will tell them we'd rather they use our seat. I just know they'll feel judged and will probably get in a huff over it so wanted to make sure I wasn't being unreasonable before I do it.

To all those saying I should buy the seat if I want a specific one, no, I'm not doing that. It's literally once every two months that it's used, at most, so I'm not paying for something that's only going to be used six times a year when there is a perfectly reasonable alternative in borrowing ours

You NEVER suck up anything to do with your kid's safety. Ever.

@gogohmm we do better now, because we know better. The testing standards are abysmal. There are seats being sold at this very moment that crash testing shows the clips on the harness disintegrate at relatively low speeds. And what is this interesting report you mentioned? It's widely known that Rear Facing until at least 4 is far safer than FF. I'd rather a child with broken legs than dead. Oh and your point about a properly installed seat is irrelevant. Of course any poorly installed seat isn't going to do the job, but this is totally different to the superior safety of RF v FF.

I'd probably say "I know I'm probably being overcautious but I'd rather use one that's crash tested to higher speeds because there's some idiots on the road!" That way you're not saying they chose wrong, just that you'd prefer a safer one

Ask them to use your seat. If it was bought online and you've never heard of the brand, it might well not conform to EU standards. There are a lot of counterfeit products on amazon, someone was killed in the US when they were in a cycle accident wearing a helmet they had bought on amazon and it claimed to conform to the US safety standard but actually it was a cheap import and did not. Nobody is checking every single product that is ordered directly from overseas.

It's a bit of a misconception that the cheaper/generic seats will "snap" if they are in a crash higher than 30mph, although some of them are very flimsy, but I would be really wary of some random amazon Chinese no-brand. Think about the phone chargers that cause fires, children's toys that just fall apart, the fake Ergo carriers etc.

This one is pretty common/popular at the moment, sold under various names (reebaby, reecle, bonio, mycarsit among others) - you can check if it's the same model by looking at whether the approval number on the orange label is the same (049564)

www.which.co.uk/reviews/child-car-seats/lettas-murphy-916

It does seem to be legitimately approved but the approval was done in Czech Republic which might be more lax? Or it meets approval but is just of a lower standard compared with other brands.

You also tend to find that the instructions on this type of seat are confusing - there was a thread here just the other day asking about the Puggle Lockton and many people thought you had to install with isofix, top tether and seatbelt (not true) and found that you can't spin it when it's properly installed (true) - I don't know for sure obviously but I believe these seats are made for the Chinese market where many people don't have top tether and although they make them with the tether so they pass the testing, they don't actually expect people to use them. You should, 100% use a tether if the seat comes with one. The whole thing could just break apart or hit the seat in front if you do not.

It's a bit of a disaster for safety as an improperly used seat could sometimes be less safe than no seat at all.

Just pick your favourite kid and they can use the ‘good’ seat.

Or tell your parents the seat they bought as shit and they should use yours.

Or buy them a better one.