Most child car seats 'fitted incorrectly'

At The Baby Shop St Albans we believe the most important purchase is your Babys' Infant Carrier. That's why we encourage customers to buy new, not used or worse, 2nd hand and we don't just fit a car seat for our customers; We train and explain!

We believe any Child Car Seat, from newborn Infant Carrier right through to they reach 12 years old or 1.35m (That's the Law) is AN INVESTMENT FOR LIFE!.

As many as 80% of child car seats are not properly fitted, according to a survey out today.

Nine out of 10 parents said they had problems fitting seats and only 6% said they received any fitting advice from retailers.

The survey comes after a Which? report found most of Britain's 22 best-selling child safety seats would fail to prevent serious or fatal injuries.

Following the publication of today's survey, Mother & Baby Magazine is calling for the Government to make it law for all children up to the age of 11 to be properly restrained in a vehicle.

The campaign also has the support of manufacturers Halfords and Britax who, together, carried out the survey with the magazine.

Half of all parents did not even know if they had bought the right car seat to fit the model of their car while 55% of parents admitted using a second-hand car seat which could be useless.

Launching the campaign, the magazine said it wanted to see heavy-on-the-spot fines introduced for any driver caught flouting the law.

Campaign director and the magazine's editor Dani Zur said: "The law in the UK for protecting children travelling in cars is woefully inadequate.

"As the law stands, it is perfectly legal for a baby, toddler or older child to rattle around in the back seat of a car with absolutely no seatbelt restraint of any kind."

The survey also revealed that one in five parents admitted allowing their young children to travel in someone else's car without a car seat - often in a grandparent's car.

One third admitted fastening a seatbelt around two small children and about the same number said they had fastened a seatbelt around themselves and a small child.

The survey also showed most parents were unaware that child car seats should never be used on any seat fitted with an airbag unless the airbag is deactivated.

Monday's Which? report rated one popular seat, sold by childwear chain Mothercare, as so poor researchers gave it an "unprecedented" mark of 0 out of a possible 100.

Which? said a crash test dummy placed in the chain's Daytona seat was thrown about with such violence that blows to its head from the seats in front, car door frame and its own knees "would have caused brain damage or death" in a child.

Mothercare said it had recently modified the Daytona model and that the seat tested by Which? was no longer available.

Which? said it believed the new version was "substantially the same seat" and urged parents to avoid it along with two others which also performed poorly in the tests - the Mon Bebe Turbo Up and the Klippan Futura.

However, it also admitted that its own tests were both "more demanding and more realistic" than the current European standard and that any properly fitted child seat would still offer better protection than not using one at all.

Full Article