Booster seat on coach for reception school trip?

[Maybeitsok]

My just turned 5 year old is going on a school trip soon via busy dual carriageway to another city, journey time approx 45 min each way. They are still in a rear facing car seat with me, which is all they know, and how they will continue until they outgrow it at 36kg or 125cm tall. They’re currently only 16kg and 107cm!

Anyway, I was reluctant to let them go on the coach but have decided to do so but with a booster seat, so I’ve bought a carry on portable one that’ll be easy enough to use.

Thing is, they’ve asked if it’s just them that’ll have this kind of seat, and it probably will be, since people aren’t that clued up on car seat safety it seems.

Has anyone else sent their 4/5 year old with a booster before? I’m fearful they’ll be ridiculed but then again not sure considering their age. Safety first in my opinion, but want them
happy too.

Slightly less safe does not equal dangerous. That’s a common, but erroneous conclusion.

But, assuming the booster seat is certified for use in a coach I’d send it. If its not certified, I’d be comparing the risks associated with a badly fitting booster seat to the risks of no booster seat.

In certain instances, kids are FIVE times more likely to be seriously injured if forward facing compared to rear facing. Thats not “slightly less safe.”

I’m sorry but you’re almost certainly wrong here. I’m unaware of any official stats comparing all child coach passenger fatalities to fatalities of specifically rear-facing children in cars. But UK coaches are statistically 100x safer than cars per mile travelled. Let that sink in. 100x safer. Any parent saying “I won’t let my child travel by coach, I’ll drive them myself in their RF car seat” is almost certainly exposing their children to an order of magnitude more danger than if they just let them go on the coach.

@SoonTheDaffodilsWillBeOver That’s quite an improvement on the car isn’t it. Maybe op should consider getting a coach?

Sounds very risky to be sending them on the coach at all tbh. 5 times more risky, I wouldn’t risk that.

Surely a rear facing car seat is best, why risk a booster? And, why risk the coach, drive them. Although, out of school grounds all day, so much danger, who knows what might happen: kidnap, accidents, allergic reactions, trips, falls, fires, strangers lurking. I wouldn’t risk that either. You’re being terribly risky.

Keep your kid at home OP, not worth the risk.

What do you do op when you go on the bus with your child ?

The buses we have been on (rarely) travel through the town center at about 20-30mph, if that!

Not on a dual carriageway doing 60-70!

They will probably be the only one with a booster.

I work at a very popular tourist attraction that also has a huge education program for children from reception to university students (in peak season we have 6 coach loads of school children a day) and we have maybe 10 trips a year where someone brings a booster seat. Usually in the younger years and usually when it was a first trip (we had quite a few in 2022/2023 after covid). How do I know about the booster seats? We get teachers asking if we have a place to store them. We have been advised by senior management not to store them - they fall under luggage (which for risk and safety reasons we are not allowed to store) and also risk of damage. If the bus is coming from around an hour away they do not stop at our trip location - they are on other jobs so the seat has to come off the coach. Even when the coach does stay, a lot of the time the seat has to come off the coach.

Usually the solution most schools come up with is that the parent either drives the child or the parent accompanies the child and carries the seat all day. Most schools also insist on parent installing the car seat. As the parent isn't part of the ratio a lot of the time the parent either has to hang around the area, drive back home or pay to go in the attraction. Since budgets are cut schools are very hot on only bringing adults in ratio so they don't get charged for adults. Also I imagine to keep peace with parents who wanted to go on the trip too. Where parents have driven in, usually the school ask the parent to meet the school group before entering our attraction.

My 5 yr old is going on a school trip too, she's only a tiny 97cm, I know 🤣, and hadn't considered a booster to be honest.

Your dp is right.

I do get it. My ds was rear facing till 4. When he started in p1 he was eligible fior the school bus. I wanted him to have a booster seat . But did nit as I didn't want him to be special or pfb.

Let your child go on the trip with his friends. Why set him up for exclusion and special treatment taking him separately.

If you're not careful you will become one if those parents whose child ends up alienated because of your actions

Imagine if every child turned up for the school trip with their own booster seat !
A coach is a much safer mode of transport than a car . It’s common sense that taking a booster seat on school trip is ridiculous.

You may be better off joining a rear facing car seat safety group on Facebook, this question has been asked and answered many times.

I've only just turned my 6 year old so do feel "clued up" on car seat safety, but I've never made an issue about car seats on coaches. The risk is tiny, in fact for me personally I think it's riskier to take them in your own car. Coaches are larger, drive slower, the drivers undergo higher levels of training and have strict rules on hours etc. Even if you were the safest driver in the world, if another car crashed into you, you would come off a lot worse than the coach would in the same accident. You're probably more likely to get hit by a car on your way to school than have an accident on the coach, so it was a risk I was comfortable taking.

Also from a practical point of view, if every parent decided to bring along car seats it would be impossible for the teachers to get them all installed properly in a reasonable time. And who takes responsibility if they are installed wrong?

But the buses lurch about even in town. You have to watch they don’t sit to close to seat in front
And also trains

I take my 3 on trains and buses and they are all under six ,we have to use mostly public train transport

don’t worry too much

Surely that entirely depends on the probability in the first place. If there’s a one in a thousand chance of serious injury in a rear facing seat then yes, five in one thousand (in certain circumstances…) is a significant increase in risk, IMO, and more dangerous. If the probability of serious injury in a rear facing seat is one in 10 million, and the risk in a front facing seat 5 in 10 million then I would contend that is slightly less safe not dangerous. Because there’s still a 99.99995% chance of not being seriously injured.

You’re wrong about two things here. You’re not being rational or reasonable, or showing any actual understanding of the relative risks involved here, and that sort of anxiety that leads you to think that you are is exactly what contributes to anxiety disorders in children. The biggest predictor of developing an anxiety disorder is having an anxious parent, two parents with anxiety leads to a very significant increase in the likelihood of developing GAD.

My DC is 10 almost 11 now but still in a High Back Booster in the car as they're below the height limit for it.

They didn't do many school trips in the early days due to Covid, but the ones they did via coach they took a booster seat, they weren't the only one! School just expected it to be labelled with their name on the bottom, and they were all stored in the coaches storage compartment underneath for the day while they were on the trip.

Tbh the way the OP is replying to some of the comments it wouldn't surprise me if they were an admin or frequent poster who jumps on people on one of the Extended Rear facing car seat groups.

It’s not unreasonable or irrational to want your child to have a proper restraint system on a coach 😂

It’s even stated on here under the coach section as best practice. Are you suggesting they are just anxious too?

www.childcarseats.org.uk/media/1018/carrying-children-safely-in-taxis-coaches-buses-and-minibuses.pdf

I CAN assure you neurotic parents are the route cause of anxiety in children.

Sure, neurotic parents behaviour can be ONE of the many contributing factors.

This isn’t neurotic, though. 😃

You can get seat belt clips for kids that adjust the height of the seatbelt so it's a better fit.

Might be worth a look? Definitely more portable than a booster seat.

“since people aren’t that clued up on car seat safety it seems”

This comes across as very patronising and holier than thou.

I don’t know any parents who aren’t clued up on car seat safety. Some parents make the decision to take their children on an occasional coach/bus/train trip without a car seat. It doesn’t mean that they aren’t as clued up as you. It doesn’t mean that you are a superior parent and smarter than them.

Are you for real? None of the kids I saw when my kid was at nursery were in rear facing car seats, which tells me the parents either didn’t know the safety statistics or didn’t care.

People in the UK forward face way earlier than is safe because that’s what they’re told to do, but it’s wrong.

It’s not about being holier than 🙄

It's astonishing the human race has survived this far if you think about it. So many people displacing such blantent disregard of so many risks....

I mean, we used to kick the bucket frequently before modern medicine but we evolved, adapted and were clearly open to change if it meant making things safer……