Baby changing facilities

[Housewife]

Interested in people's views on existing baby changing facilities. Sometimes I have been totally shocked at the disgusting places restaurants, service stations, supermarkets etc expect us to change our babies in. Was quite impressed with the facilities at Lakeside shopping centre however and wondered if anyone has any thoughts on what's really good/ really awful/gets your blood boilign etc

Poor you Bugsy - how awful. Frightening to think how uncontrollable and unreasonable some people's rage can be, especially when they have children.

Bugsy - Horrible woman, I hope she doesnt go off the handle with her children like that if they happen to say something she doesnt quite like.

I see this all the time at supermarkets, especially in the disabled spaces. It really annoys me that people are so lazy, if I were disabled I would be so angry! The spaces are always taken and it does make me want to say something, usually I just scowl at them, but if I were disabled I would say something.

What right have they to be angry with you? They are the ones in the wrong! Some people are just so despicable!

How horrible. I hate it when people park there, I saw a couple (older but not elderly!) park in my Sainsburys once. Being a chicken I didnt approach them but told the customer service desk when I went in. I had had to park right at the other side in a normal space, whilst they had 'my' space. A few minutes later they tannoyed 'the driver of car, registration ...'. I was terrified they would know it was me, and did my shopping pretty quickly! But i felt better knowing I had done something.

I went and complained to Tesco customer service about it once, as when I approached the spaces they were being taken by people waiting in there cars while someone was obviously popping in to get something really quickly. I felt too scared to approach these people and ask them to move - and judging from Bugsy's experience I think I was right. I was really annoyed because Tesco had just set up a system where you need to display a (free)badge in your car to be able to park there, I had one and still couldn't get parked. I asked customer service who was actually checking the carpark for these badges and they admitted that no-one did!!

Another really annoying incident with shops is still playing on my mind 6 months after it happened and I really wish I'd written a letter of complaint at the time, because it nearly happened again to me a couple of weeks ago.Our local Debenhams has a pay and display carpark on top of it and conveniently has a lift from the carpark into the shop itself and from there you can access the main shopping area of the town (Barrow in Furness if anyone's interested). I always park there for that factor alone and subsequently spend a fortune in Debenhams on the way out of it! The trouble is this is the ONLY way to access the top level carpark if you have a pushchair or are disabled. Now when I was shopping just before Xmas last year (so imagine the state of the pushchair laden with bags of shopping) I had just paid for my purchases in Debenhams as the tills closed at 5.30pm (yes, it is still the dark ages round these parts!)So on hearing the tannoy announce the shop was now closing. I got myself and pushchair with 12 month old daughter in the lift and to the top level, when got out I discovered the outer door locked and shutter pulled down. I went back down to customer services and they informed me they couldn't open the door and once it was closed t would not be reopened. They then said they would let me out of the side door, so I followed the woman expecting to come out on the carpark (which may I add does not close til 6pm), but instead they led me to the bottom of the CAR RAMP! So in the dark and cold I had to push the heavy pushchair up the winding car ramp, with 180 degree turns on each side and no room to move to should a car have swung round the corner, it is also walled so a driver wouldn't have even seen us til it was too late. I arrived at the top in tears and exhausted. It was hideous and other than taking the narrow stairs to the top of the building (this is 3 storeys high) there is no access. It nearly happened the other week when a member of staff refused to let me into the shop at the shopping arcade, shouting at me through the glass door that it had closed, when I told her that I just wanted to get to the carpark with the pushchair, she blankly refused to open the door. It was only when a customer wanted to come out and stood in fron of the automatic doors which opened from the inside I got in and told her how ridiculous I thought it was, she replied well you can try the top doors but they'll probably be closed - it was exactly 5.30! Luckily the door was open at the top but I was damn sure that this time they weren't going to make me walk up the car-ramp, have you ever heard anything so ridiculous. This is not as if it is an old building, it was only built a few years ago...

Sorry, am pleased to write that all down at last - I should have complained when it happened, has anyone ever done this to a large company and what sort of response did you get?

What really annoys me in shops with so called 'parent rooms', is there is not usually a toilet for us parents. The one shop that usually seems to cater for everyone ie baby, toddler and parent is John Lewis. They definitely get my vote everytime.

I totally agree about the excellent facilities at Bluewater, but again the baby changing in John Lewis is great (my son likes having his bottom changed whilst staring out the window!)

We are now starting potty training and I am appalled at some of the toilets I find my son having to use.

If I find I'm stuck without a mother and baby spot I park in the middle of two normal spots (space permitting obviously). I'm just waiting for the day when someone accuses me of not being able to park properly!

At the County Mall in Crawley the parent and baby spots are on the first level of the multi storey. At this level there are also 'automatic' door which are a god send when you've a double pushchair. However, you have to press a button to open them...and they swing outwards....so you have to do the door openning shuffle ie approach door, press button, walk backwards, let door clear you and then walk forwards again! And, if the parent and baby spots are full and you park on the other levels the doors are the very stiff and narrow swing variety...a nightmare to get through. And they have signs up saying they got awards for this car park! And the lifts are always full of able bodied people so getting down to the shopping levels takes forever....Grrr

Can I just add that although it's incredibly annoying what you've all said, at least you've got them. I do my shopping in France, sometimes Germany, and in these parts at least there are no such things as parent parking spots, nor are their baby changing facilites, and nor are there shopping trolleys for babies, or more than one child. At the moment my toddler sits in the seat - just about - no safety strap - I MUST remember to dig out my reins & attatchment next time, and I have to balance my baby in car seat precariously across top. TYo put shopping in or out of trolley I have to shove baby one way or t'other. Then, at the checkout, I have to take him off alotogether as it isn't wide enough to push the torlley through with car seat on top.

Now he's coming up to growing out of his stage 0+ car seat, so I have no idea how I'll do the shopping when I can't balance him on the trolley any more. Does anyone have any great ideas? My toddler is too young to walk round the supermarket, plus he's going through another hilarious phase of running off again.

In our local supermarket, the isles & the checkout are so narrow you can't take a pushchair in. Most mother leave their babies in pushchair on the pavement outside. I just don't go the the supermarket at all. Things are definitely better for you in the UK in therms of facilities, even if the paper has run out sometimes.

Hmonty, I'm not sure what your traffic wardens are like, but where I live you would incur a hefty fine if you parked over two spaces in a public carpark (ie not a supermarket or store carpark). A friend once got fined because her car bumper was overhanging the white line of her parking space!!

On the subject of facilities, I've just returned from 6 weeks in America, and I have to say, the provison here is far superior to anything I saw there . Some of the motorway service areas don't even have toilets let alone baby changing facilities and public toilets are either non-existant or yucky.

Well for me Bluewater is good but can be quite smelly out of paper and quite often you must queue ! And not all rooms are the same : in some you can't breastfeed there is no chair !

Again - UK is far better than most other countries... count your blessings !

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