Child seats in a van

[KateWarr]

Hi Everyone,

I've got 2 girls - Madison (2 years 4 months) and Freya (3 years 10 months).

I'm in the process of setting up a business and need to use a van. I'm looking at one with a double seat at the front so that I can fit 2 car seats on it. Has anyone done this? And if so what seats have you used as the double seat only measures 32 inches across? Any advice would be very welcome as I'm drawing a bit of a blank.

Many thanks

Kate x

hi, i would contact somehere like the in car safety centre in essex(cathy or vicky) or the in car safety centre in belfast or milton leynes. they are all very helpful over the phone.

we have britax hi-liners for our older 2, and a britax eclipse for our youngest.

they fit together really well,as the shape of the eclipse means it sits far enough forward that the headrest of the high backed booster sits kind of behind the seat part of the eclipse,so they fit together well,and dont take up a lot of space.

find out if it is legal (in the manual)to have a seat in the middle in the front or it may invalidate your insurance

why on earth would it not be legal?

some vans reanult traffic vw transporter specifically state no child seats in middle seat in the front and no child seats in the rear row,(for the 9 seater versions) in the manual.

really?i take it thats to do with the way the seatbelts are?
we were given a renult modus (smaller version of the scenic) as a courtesy car,luckily we only had 2dc (i was pregnant with dc3), but the manual said that the middle seat wasnt suitable for a child seat because the seatbelt came from the roof and wouldnt hold a seat securely!i wonder how many people have bought scenics as they are larger,thinking they can put 3 seats in it,when actually they cant!

sazm yes me, i had a grand scenic and had to put 2 hbbs in the boot seats and didn't find out to i had sold it that actually some of the 'people carriers' had seats that weren't actually suitable for car seats! i bought it from new and the garage knew i needed it for this reason and no one once said that i couldn't do it! am looking at 7 seaters again and am going to ask to read the manuals this time.

We had a look at the grand scenic when i was preg with dc3,as we thought the extra seats might be handy,plus plenty room for the kids bikes/dog etc in there,then got the modus,and when i read the manual and seen that i thought it was utter madness! a people carrier which only actually has 2 spaces for child seats(and the boot which lots of people don't reckon are safe)!!!

also to add,the guy in arnold clark was telling us how great they are for a family,so he obv hadn't read the manual either, if we did buy it and then discover this,im sure they wouldnt refund us or offer a replacement,once we realised it was more impractical than a corsa!!

Hi All,

Thanks very much for your replies . I'm especially interested in your reply sazm as Madison is in a Britax Eclipse at the moment so if we could buy a booster that fitted really well with it it might solve the problem. I'm going to look up the manual for the vans on the web to check whether it's legal. I imagine the vans with the gear stick in a normal car position may have a problem but the van I'm interested in has the gear stick on the console so I can't really see why it wouldn't be allowed - but I'll defintely check.

Cheers
Kate

i think its more to do with the seatbelts,the one in the modus we had came from the roof,and not the seat and because of the position it was in it wouldnt have held a child seat securely.

the hi-liner is on offer in halfords (about £45 i think) we have the pink polka one for dd,she loves it!