BRU car seat selector

[Mystie81]

Has anyone seen the new car seat selector on BRU??? it is terrible. they are giving out false informtion

for one search it says FF infant/child car seats - use rear-facing for infants 5-35lbs and up to 1yr of age!?? then it says can be used FF at 20lbs OR 1 yr of age up to 40lbs...

[joolsplus3]

Is that on the .com, or on the big sign in the carseat section? (Which happens to have the 'make the harness slots at or below the shoulders on FF seats' misinformation in large easy to read typeface :()

[mommycat]

I am assuming someone already informed them they are full of sh#t? :(

[Mystie81]

its on the canadian BRU. i dont know if they have it on the US site

[Mystie81]

I am assuming someone already informed them they are full of sh#t? :(

i hope so. I'm not a tech and im not technical enough to write to them, but i do know its wrong lol this will make ppl turn their kids even sooner than 1 yrs old! :eek:

[Pixels]

The US site is ok. Not great, but ok. At or above for FFing, 1 and 20. The chart they have makes it look like the only option for a 1 year old is FFing, but underneath there is a section on common mistakes. They list not having the restraint installed tight enough (1 inch rule), switching to FFing too soon (AAP recommendations), and not using the correct harness slots. :thumbsup:

:thumbsdown: to the Canadian version

[canmom]

I drafted an e-mail but can't find a e-mail addy to send it to :confused: should I call the 1-800 number?

[snowbird25ca]

I looked for a contact us link when I spotted it and didn't see anything other than the toll free number so didn't go any further than that with it.

Unless it's been changed since I first saw it, as soon as you put the baby's weight above 20lbs it goes into a ff'ing restraint regardless of age. :thumbsdown:

[canmom]

Glad I'm not the only one that couldn't find an e-mail... weird most sites have it. Oh well, I will call this afternoon when the kids go down for a nap. That is bad info, implies they can only rf up to 1 year as per manufacturer... not sure where that is coming from either way someone is going to see it and use the information.

[techie]

Here you go

http://www.toysruscanada.ca/eng/contact.asp

[canmom]

Thanks Techie!!

e-mail addy is customerservice.canada@toysrus.com if anyone else wants to send them a note!

[snowbird25ca]

I emailed them. Thanks for the email address. :)

[canmom]

I e-mailed too... and got a response pretty quick...

Thank you very much for sharing your concern with us
regarding the car seat. We will forward the email to appropriate recipients
and they will review the seat safety and make whatever
change necessary.

Toysrus customer service.

Hopefully they can change it ASAP.

[snowbird25ca]

I e-mailed too... and got a response pretty quick...



Hopefully they can change it ASAP.

Wow, that was quick. I got an automated reply of thanks for your inquiry blah-blah-blah, up to 72hrs for response I think it said.

[Mystie81]

I guess the emails worked because i can't access the car seat selector anymore. I hope they fix all the errors before they put it back. Thanks everyone for emailing them. :thumbsup:

[canmom]

YAAAAY!!:D I hope it comes back on A LOT better then it was. They have lots of techs that work there... why don't they ask you for advice?

[shauburg]

I guess the emails worked because i can't access the car seat selector anymore. I hope they fix all the errors before they put it back. Thanks everyone for emailing them. :thumbsup:

That's funny because I got an e-mail earlier today from TRU about this new car seat selector and when I opened it tonight and clicked on the link, no car seat selector came up. I just thought maybe it wasn't up yet (because sometimes I get their sale e-mails before the sale starst), but it turns out the car-seat.orgs sleuths were responsible! LOL

[snowbird25ca]

YAAAAY!!:D I hope it comes back on A LOT better then it was. They have lots of techs that work there... why don't they ask you for advice?

Well, if corporate is anything like individual stores, don't get me started....

Let's just say they would rather have somebody untrained and with no experience (no kids or anything else,) go through carseat modules with staff than have a certified tech review the training modules. Yet I'm the one that does the correcting of information when those same supposedly "trained" employees are telling parents to turn their 10mo old ff'ing because they've outgrown the infant carrier. They'd rather have them giving out potentially deadly and illegal information than have somebody take 20mins to review a module with an employee. Explain that logic to me. :rolleyes:

:soapbox:

At least they pulled the tool down that quickly. :thumbsup:

I don't know what other people included in their emails, but I gave them a list of when the selector should change from one thing to another and suggested it displaying 2 options at the same time. This would provide the correct minimums and best practice options to parents who were searching for seats. :)

[mommycat]

I don't know what other people included in their emails, but I gave them a list of when the selector should change from one thing to another and suggested it displaying 2 options at the same time. This would provide the correct minimums and best practice options to parents who were searching for seats. :)
I hope they listen to you/us for once!!!

[snowbird25ca]

I hope they listen to you/us for once!!!

I have a response from them and I'm going to be working with them to give input on the selector before it goes live again.:D

[mommycat]

That's awesome!!!! :D

[Mystie81]

Yay Trudy that's awesome!! I'm glad it will be fixed! It will be such a great tool for parents.

[shauburg]

I have a response from them and I'm going to be working with them to give input on the selector before it goes live again.:D

They should pay you for that!

[snowbird25ca]

They should pay you for that!

LOL, that would be so awesome! :)

I haven't heard back from the lady yet, so I'm hoping to hear soon.

[SoccerMom]

It's back up and seems much better and more accurate.

[CelticLabyrinth]

I'm not sure if I would say "better", as it says to FF a 22 lb 1 1/2 year old... with no suggestion that RF is a perfectly fine solution at that age and weight.

[mommycat]

It's still a bit disappointing to see it tell me that I should look at forward facing seats for my 23lb 16mo.

Hah, too slow typing.

[SoccerMom]

AH! See what happens when I just look at the pictures!:doh: But I don't think I tried that part and just put in my kids stats. I should have looked further.
infant/child seat - "convert to FF at 22 lbs and 1 year of age" :eek:

At least a 31lb 4 year old has the FF suggestion and not a booster as it was before. (I'm just trying to see the bright side)

The 2009 Baby Guide says "infant/child - use RF for infants 5-30lbs* and up to 1 year of age" *= weight requirements may very by manufacturer.

I'm sure there is far more bad info there too...Brad is up from his nap, so I'll have to look later.

[mommycat]

The 2009 Baby Guide says "infant/child - use RF for infants 5-30lbs* and up to 1 year of age" :( *sigh*

[snowbird25ca]

I had the opportunity to offer input on the selector tool before it went live again - unfortunately I'm having troubles finding it on the site to know how much they used and what they didn't as I only saw a midpoint edit and not the final version. While I know we would all like to see as much info out there as possible, there are always limitations with any given format - and sometimes fixing critical life threatening errors is really all that can be done.

The tool is not set up in a way that it could display both rf'ing and ff'ing for a child that met both criteria. At least now it doesn't give ff'ing for an option under 1yr old. There is a comment about rf'ing very similar to the one that used to be in TC's 1-2-3-4 car time brochure, granted it's not bold print and flashing, but it's there anyways.

I put a lot of thought into the selector and tried to figure out if there was a way to work within the structure to provide more best practice information. In the end though, I ended up accepting the limitations of the format - a format which was provided to them so they had to work within those confines. The other thing is that the selector tool's job is to suggest appropriate seats for their child's age and stage. It may not reflect best practice, but if it's at least giving correct information that's the crux of the matter. If a convertible seat is still presented as an option once the child is of the minimums to ff then that's something. And at least parents with 6mo olds won't be buying an apex now... I've seen criticized on the board here multiple times how Britax's seat selector tool would recommend a booster for a 40lb 1yr old. Having played with this selector tool and thought about the limitations of the format, I understand why it is that the 40lb 1yr old booster option is there. I might not like it, but I understand it.

Sometimes when it comes to mass distribution of something like this, all that matters is that the information is correct. Until laws change, and until society changes, change will have to keep coming from a grassroots level - ie us. A seat selector tool simply can't be everything - as much as we might like it to be. :o At least if a parent with a kid outgrowing the bucket is buying a convertible instead of a combination seat it's making a positive change. I guess in some ways it's like how kids don't always leave seat checks perfectly safe - they leave safer than they came in, but not always completely safe. But any improvement is a good improvement.

I'm not having success with finding the replacement tool, so if someone can link me to it I'd appreciate it. I'm curious to see how much they changed and how much they left as is. :thumbsup:

[mommycat]

Thank you, Trudy, for all the thought you put into improving this tool. :)

(I still reserve the right to whine about the limitations. Hee.)

Here's the link, it's the big part when you click on the "carseats" category from the main page.
http://www.toysrus.ca/category/index.jsp?categoryId=2582967&cp=2582967

[mommycat]

And after looking at it again, I am not as upset. I had originally changed the weight first so there were still 3 circles in the pictorial part of the tool. I didn't realize that these options were changing and ASSumed that the text (which I really wish wasn't there, but there you go) was telling me which circle to go to. Now that I tried it again it makes more sense. :o

[QuassEE]

:thumbsup: Trudy :thumbsup:

[snowbird25ca]

Thank you, Trudy, for all the thought you put into improving this tool. :)

(I still reserve the right to whine about the limitations. Hee.)

Here's the link, it's the big part when you click on the "carseats" category from the main page.
http://www.toysrus.ca/category/index.jsp?categoryId=2582967&cp=2582967

I'm clicking on the link and looking and going "it's still not there." :confused:

Then I remembered that dh put adblock plus onto my firefox. :ROTFLMAO:

I'm very happy at the end result truth be told. They took almost every suggestion I made and even replaced "accident" with "collision" in the booster description.

Like I said, this may not reflect best practice, but it is accurate - and it's so much better than what parents are finding in other places or hearing from friends.

[Mystie81]

I'm clicking on the link and looking and going "it's still not there." :confused:

Then I remembered that dh put adblock plus onto my firefox. :ROTFLMAO:



lol thanks for posting that. I was looking around the site all confused as well wondering why I couldn't find the car seat selector thingy!

I do agree that it seems much better than it was. I only played with it a little though.