DS, 8mo fell from trolley yesterday and fractured his skull :(

[rosieposey]

Just wanted to post this to save anyone else going through what we did yesterday.

I never shop at Morrisons (basically because we have lots of other supermarkets to choose from and im pretty loyal to S/burys usually) but yesterday I was nearest to that store so popped in with DS who is nearly 9 months old.

I got a trolley but noticed that it didn't have any belts on it to tie him in. Every other supermarket that i have ever shopped in has a strap and i have always used it. Anyway DS and i were at the checkout and i took my attention off him for about 30 seconds as i began to pack the bags and the next thing i knew he had hit their concrete floor... I didn't see what happened from the time he was happily sitting up in the trolley to when he hit the floor it was all over so fast.

I was obviously in shock and picked him up (he was screaming btw) they took me to the managers office to wait for an ambulance but my DH was working from home and we decided it would be faster to drive to A&E. I asked the manager before i left why they didn't have any straps on their trolleys (the sitting up kind not the baby seat kind) to hold babies and toddlers in and he told me that you had to ask at customer services for them as their trolleys aren't fitted with them due to the straps getting wet and dirty and that is company policy. He also told me that on the handle of the trolley (where you put your hands to push the damn thing) there is a "small sign" - his words- (there is, its the size of a text message) to say to go to customer services if you require a strap.

I have had their area manager on the phone this morning and have explained that as a first time customer i didnt see the two inch notice on their bars to push the trolleys as i had my son in the trolley and i was pushing him?

I feel terrible and responsible for even putting him in a trolley without straps - it could have been a whole lot worse as the doctor said last night that he could have been brain damaged or killed. Whilst i have been in supermarkets i have often seen babies and children in trolleys without straps and thought to myself how irresponsible those parents must be, i myself yesterday was one of them too - i am so at Morrisons for not providing seat belts as a matter of course the way other supermarkets to in their trolleys (or at least the ones that i shop at) but just wanted to say that after all this please dont use a trolley without a strap, its just not worth it, i will never take the chance again and will also be letting Morrisons head office know that next time a child falls out of one of their trolleys because they have no straps fitted to them that it might not be the same outcome.

DS is fine btw, the top of his head is very red and swollen today though. He was admitted at lunchtime yesterday after his xray showed a fracture but by 8 pm the peadiatrician said he could go home as he was his usual bubbly self - needless to say i will be wrapping him up in cotton wool for the foreseeable future and just keeping a very close eye on him for bumps and bruises But just wanted to say IMO Morrisons company policy for having to ask for a strap (when there are no obvious signs saying you need to do that) is Shit.

It's all coming back to me...

Ikea and Costco don't - or didn't - provide baby-seats in trolleys either. I remember putting DD inside trolleys in both places, strapped into her car seat...

Oh Rosie so sorry to hear about your poor DS!

Was just discussing this with DH and I asked him if he would have gone to customer services to get the straps (if we had seen the sign) and we both agree we probably wouldn't have - so as someone else has already said - there but for the grace of God.

FWIW I also think you have been really brave starting this thread as I think you will make many mumsnetters think twice when presented with a similar situation in the future.

Love to your DS and hugs to you

Hi Mcdreamy (i have replied to your thread you posted a while back about moving btw )

Thanks for the more postive replys and kind words everyone it really does mean a lot as tbh honest i feel bad enough without being told guilt is normal when your a parent, i know that i have been a parent for nearly 18 years so feel bloody terrible about my poor DS.

Perhaps when it comes to child safety all supermarkets should be forced to supply seats with straps, someone said earlier in the thread that trolleys were industrial equipment but i still maintain that they do have facilities for children to sit in them and therefore should be required to have mandatory straps, like for example a buggy or a highchair. I know there will be people who say that you have to take total responsibility for your DC's safety when they are using those kinds of things and i agree with that wholeheartedly but i would have to say that there are probably always times when you take your attention off your child for just a few seemingly innocuous seconds, i underestimated by a long shot just how mobile my DS was - i have never used a trolley without a restraint before so had no way of knowing how mobile he was in it and even though we were only there for about 25 minutes he was sitting quietly in front of me for that time.

Gertie, i am overly cautious with my DC's too, just ask my 17 year old DD who i still make text me when she is in college safely Milo is too big for one of those carry around car seats and we moved him to a big stage 2/3 seat two weeks ago otherwise i would have taken him in in his 'little baby' one.

The point of this thread is yes i am pissed off at Morrisons for not making the information obvious that you can obtain straps that you can make your child safe with but i am also more than aware that i am to blame as well not perhaps for taking the risk of packing my shopping and diverting my attention from DS but for risking him going around the supermarket in a trolley without a restraint.

Morrisons and every supermarket/retail store should provide restraints, it might not be completely fail safe and yes don't rely on them totally but i can with total honesty say that my son wouldn't have fallen out of that trolley had i seen the sign on the handle because i would have gotten the straps needed to make him safe.

I have put a photo up on my profile of the trolley handle that he fell out of (dh took it) and the sign to say about the straps are to the left in the smallest text and about where your left hand would be pushing it, i am observant but when dealing with a baby or toddler i fail to see how anyone would notice this.

Child safety is paramount for all of us and yes i know it was just a near miss but the next person it happens to that might not be the case. DH and i will try and get Morrisons to change their policy and maybe supply newer trolleys that have intergral straps. Better still wouldn't it be great if all supermarkets and retail outlets had to provide straps, not everyone has a cardigan, rope, dog lead ect ect to sort out a makeshift strap.

Notasausage i will contact environmental health thanks for the heads up as might have gone the H&S executive route first. jenski i didnt know you had to provide your name and address to get the straps at Morrisons and i agree with you about better to have tatty straps than none at all.

DS is happy as anything today but the left side of his skull is still very swollen, am absolutely shitting myself about letting him get about atm but am just keeping a really close eye on him so he cant get into too much mischief, thanks again for all the kind words, if this makes just a few more people strap their DC's in then that would be great

Sorry for the essay!

Shite, cant upload photo of trolley handle sorry

Regarding Orm's factory example, I thought that it wasn't sufficient to let employees know about safety equipment and regulations - you had to ensure they were used and followed. That is certainly true in Science lessons in school. You have to make sure children are wearing their safety specs, not just tell them to do so. Obviously there is a difference in your case, and it depends what the duty of care is of Morrisons to their customers.

I hope both you and your DS are recovering.

I am interested in the post where someone else said that the information at their Morrisons was also displayed on a large unmissable sign.

I would guess that any legislation om the subject would require the information re straps available to be "clearly displayed" which it obviously wasn't in this instance.

I wonder whether your branch has "found," or dusted off their big unmissable sign yet, Rosie.

I would second bypassing Morrisons and going elsewhere to complain. They are not the most caring of supermarkets, IME. My DS1 has severe allergies and we regularly receive product alerts from the anaphylaxis campaign. These are almost always funded by the company whose fault the problem is, unless they are a tiny business who really can't afford it. Morrisons refused to pay for hundreds of seriously allergic people to be told not to eat something it had not bothered to label properly, ie to ensure they did not die from Morrisons' mistake. Can you tell I am not Morrisons' greatest fan?

Yeah not mine anymore either BalloonSlayer even whilst i was waiting for my DH to arrive the manager was getting a strap from behind customer services and said that the sign to tell you about them was on the trolley - i didn't see how small it was till the next day.

Funny you should mention that they might have dusted off their big unmissable sign by now because i didn't see it when i was there and the manager didn't mention it when he told me about the sign on the trolley, he just seemed to be under the impression that the only info was on the trollies. The customer services manager when she phoned yesterday said that there was a poster in the store too, but the manager wasnt obviously aware of it and neither was i

The labeling issue doesn't surprise me either, the trolleys were pretty old and decrepit imo and i know they are supposed to be quite expensive to replace, Asda, Tesco and S/burys all have newer ones but i suppose as supermarkets go they have more money.

" That is certainly true in Science lessons in school. You have to make sure children are wearing their safety specs, not just tell them to do so."

That is presumably because they are minors. As long as they PPE is available, the employees have been trained in their correct use and been told that failure to use them will result in disciplinary measures, the company is covered. After all you cannot be 100% sure that no-one anywhere in a huge building is failing to wear their toe-tectors and hard hats at all times.

Sounds as if you have been very lucky indeed. When ds was that age I would regularly have a go at the manager of whatever supermarket I found myself in about the poor state of the baby seats. If the straps weren't there or weren't secure I would shop elsewhere. If that wasn't possible then I would put ds in his pushchair and carry a basket.

Not read the whole thread but this is definitely of interest to a local paper and I'd advise you to do it because it will raise the issue publicly, not just for Morrisons but for other supermarkets.
More importantly I really feel for you - what a traumatic experience and one which could have happened to me at times. So relieved for you that he's ok.

This is Rosies' DH here;

She's shown me this thread, and the thing that has stood out to me is that several supermarkets (etc) don't seem to have a safe system for securing young children in their trolleys - ie there seems to be no legislation compelling such places to have the necessary equipment to ensure babies, infants etc are completely safe. This seems very wrong to me - if prams, high chairs, car seats etc have to have integral systems to secure children, then why not trolleys? The nightmare scenario of a mother struggling round shops with their young children seems a common theme, so why not make it easier for what appears to me to be relatively little outlay?

Rosie and I have (obviously) talked a lot about what happened; we aren't trying to get compensation or take on Morrisons in particular, but rather feel that this is a wider issue which could easily be corrected - and would prevent other incidents like ours from being repeated in the future, with potentially worse consequences.

Orm; your point actually supports my argument. You say that employers train employees in safety matters, and threaten disciplinary action against those who don't comply. However supermarkets clearly have not been given guidance or threatened with any form of monitoring (let alone sanctions) regarding providing trolleys which (more or less - nothing is 100%) guarantee the safety of minors. It is hard to monitor hundreds of employees - it is not hard to monitor a relatively small number of supermarket chains, all of whom are used by large quantities of mothers who have a vested interest in ensuring they comply.

Sorry for the long post (and thread hijack) - but just wanted to put my point across. We aren't trying to shift blame, we're just trying to ensure this doesn't happen to anyone else in the future.

rosie Don't beat yourself up, you had him in the trolley seat, you can't watch him all the time, and you didn't know the straps were available from customer services. It was a scary accident. SO what if straps get wet/dirty, they should be on the trolleys!!

For what it's worth, I work in x-ray, and have seen many small children with broken bones from being in the main body of the trolley, either sitting or standing. It bugs the shit out of me, and I struggle not to say anything when I see children/toddlers in trolleys like this in supermarkets. However, I have never seen a baby that has been hurt from being in the actual seat, so please don't blame yourself!

The trolleys in UK supermarkets seem to be really rubbish for putting babies in.

When we lived in the US quite a lot of the trolleys had special sections that you could put car seats into. The car seat was strapped on the trolley. As lomn as your child fitted in a baby car seat, they could stay in the car seat while on the trolley. Mind you we were in Atlanta and they drive everywhere"!

Well yes Orm, school are of course different, but DH is pretty adamant about it too, and he works in the engineering industry.

If you really want to change this, find a personal injury solicitor who will take this on a No Win No Fee basis. This is the only thing they will listen to.

You can always give any damages to a children's charity if you feel uncomfortable about profiting from the accident.

You can show them this thread and what everyone says.

It's a bit much that straps getting wet seems a spurious argument. There are trolley "parks" in the Morrisons I go to and the rest of trolleys are kept under cover. Why doesn't that happen at yours?

And dirty? Well, yes. That does happen.

I go to Morrisons once or twice a week for the last year and I have never seen any notices about this. I have never noticed anything on the trolleys either.

From HSE site:

"Employers? general duties
In general, the duties of employers include:

keeping the workplace safe and without risks to health;
drawing up a health and safety policy statement if there are five or more employees;
ensuring articles and hazardous substances are moved, stored and used safely;
providing adequate welfare facilities;
giving employees the information, instruction, training and supervision necessary for maintaining health and safety;
appointing a competent person(s) to assist with health and safety responsibilities and consulting employees or their safety representative about this appointment;
preventing or adequately controlling exposure to hazardous substances that may cause damage to the health of employees and others affected by the undertaking;
providing free any protective clothing or equipment, where risks are not adequately controlled by other means;
ensuring that appropriate safety signs are provided and maintained;
reporting certain injuries, diseases and dangerous occurrences to the appropriate health and safety enforcing authority.
In particular, the employer must:

assess the risks to employees? health and safety. If there are five or more employees, they must record the significant findings of the assessment;
identify measures for controlling the risks;
make arrangements for putting those measures into effect; and
ensure those measures continue to work and are correctly used.

Employees? duties
Employees have legal duties under the law. They include:

taking reasonable care for their own health and safety and that of others who may be affected by what they do or don't do;
co-operating with the employer on health and safety;
correctly using work items provided by the employer, including personal protective equipment;
using all safe systems of work in accordance with training or instructions;
not interfering with or misusing anything provided for their health, safety or welfare"

Not that this is relevant to this case but the principle remains.

you poor poor thing. What a terrible shock! I hope he recovers soon.

meliflououscauliflower the thing is there are covered trolley bays the same way that there are in most supermarkets, there is also a shelter running around the building where when i went back after the accident i noticed that they kept the moulded specialist type baby seats, these have straps on obviously and are kept outside under the sheltered bit that runs around the front of the supermarket.

I didn't think of this before but it kind of makes a mockery of their 'company policy' doesn't it given that they are happy to leave out straps that are integral to their moulded baby seats intended for small babies but not straps on their regular trolleys? These trolleys are outside all the time with straps on.

A campaign for safe seating for babies and small children in supermarket trolleys is a worthwhile one I think. After all, it's not as if the supermarket giants with their massive profits are short of a bob or two!

IME I think I have been spoiled at my local large Asda which has a good range of choices: metal tray across top of trolley with straps to strap car seats into, single or twin moulded seats, and generally the normal trolleys have working straps.

After reading this thread though, I remembered when I went to stay at my parents' and we went to their local Morrisons when DS was a baby, having terrible trouble finding a trolley I could use with his car seat. I asked customer services and they got the trolley man to go and dig one out from a dark corner of the car park somewhere. i remember being a bit .

Ikea are also surprisingly rubbish with no seats for babies or car seats.

However HSE notwithstanding I think you are quite right to point this out to the company. Regardless of the rights and the wrongs it could happen to anyone and no-one, least of all Morrisons I suspect, would want to see it happen again.

I'm glad your DS is OK now.

Thanks Ormirian, he certainly seems to be on the mend now.

AngeChica the awful thing is we have a huge Asda supercentre near us and i do use it sometimes but mostly S/burys, this was the first (and last) time i have ever used Morrisons simply because i was a couple of streets away and it was closest, both Asda and S/burys provide trolleys with straps (as do Tesco im pretty sure).

I think it has been worthwhile letting other posters know the dangers of using trolleys without straps, i have seen even in supermarkets that provide straps plenty of parents who don't. My beef with Morrisons is more about the fact that straps are available but their information delivery on this is crap.

I think that the more people who are aware of this the better, someone else said that Netto didn't provide straps either and it seems such a cheap and relatively easy thing to do considering the amount of mothers who shop with their babies/children.

I know i cant be the only mum this has happened to (well i know that for sure due to all of the posters on here telling of their near misses) but it would be great to raise awareness and perhaps if Morrisons agreed to change their policy then others would follow suit.

hi - i just wanted to say thank you so much for posting your experience; dd is just starting to grow out of the babyseats in the trolleys, and i had not thought about the safety of the bigger seats. i am about to go and buy so reins to keep in my car so that i can fix her in securely strap or no strap! i'm sure you have prevented this happening to other babies by posting this (and taking some flak for it, which i just find weird that some would attack you when you have just had this horrendous thing happen and are just trying to give your opinion - which i agree with - and stop it happening again!). i hope your ds - and you - are feeling better today.

jb xxx

I am so pleased your ds is OK, but OMG how scary for you!

My dd fell out of the trolley seat, thankfully she fell into the trolley...this was only while I was swiping my card to pay & she did had a strap on (fixed to trolley) but only the lap type, so don't feel too guilty as it can happen with a strap!

I was incredibly lucky she fell the way she did, but I don't trust the strap to keep her contained (she was trying to get out when she fell, she must have been, she was 14mths!) so now I use part of her reins. The strap part that you hold on to comes off & you can clip the harness to anything that has D rings, or the trolley bars. This way she cannot move enough to be able to topple over the top again!

I hope your little boy bounces back quickly!

oh, i meant to ask as well (and I hope i am not breaking any rules doing this); i am a member of a MC on another forum, and wondered if you would mind if i cut and pasted your original message on there, as i am sure they would appreciate the warning too? no worries if not, just thought i would ask (and i would of course remove any names etc).