EmmaCPST
CPST Instructor
A long distance dear friend of mine and her husband went to the only CPST they could find in their area... a fire station 30 minutes away to have someone go through installing their Keyfit for them. The tech had never heard of Chicco before and asked if it was foreign and told them the seat needs to be US approved. :thumbsdown:
She told them they had to put the seat outboard because the middle isn't safe (this is an Acura MDX btw), put shelf liner under the seat because leather seats aren't safe either (yep she said that), installed the Keyfit with the seat belt locked AND through the lockoff. She also told them the handle needs to be down and moved the passenger seat way far forward (which is where my very pregnant friend was sitting, thanks for putting her six inches from the airbag). And told them they need to forward face as soon as their baby is 20 pounds or his feet touch the back of the seat.
She was frantically texting me the whole time and I pretty much told her just to be polite and ignore everything they said, but it's so so frustrating to me. I spend a LOT of time with families making sure they understand best practice and making sure that THEY know how to install their seat, I hate that there are so many techs (haha my friend is awesome and asked to see her cert card, so this lady was an actual current tech) that are so uninformed.
Sorry, I know this gets discussed a lot around here (sucks that it happens enough for it to be discussed so often!) but I just had to rant a little bit to people that get it. I'm mad my friends wasted their time on such bad information and even more mad that so many other people that don't know better are getting bad information.
She told them they had to put the seat outboard because the middle isn't safe (this is an Acura MDX btw), put shelf liner under the seat because leather seats aren't safe either (yep she said that), installed the Keyfit with the seat belt locked AND through the lockoff. She also told them the handle needs to be down and moved the passenger seat way far forward (which is where my very pregnant friend was sitting, thanks for putting her six inches from the airbag). And told them they need to forward face as soon as their baby is 20 pounds or his feet touch the back of the seat.
She was frantically texting me the whole time and I pretty much told her just to be polite and ignore everything they said, but it's so so frustrating to me. I spend a LOT of time with families making sure they understand best practice and making sure that THEY know how to install their seat, I hate that there are so many techs (haha my friend is awesome and asked to see her cert card, so this lady was an actual current tech) that are so uninformed.
Sorry, I know this gets discussed a lot around here (sucks that it happens enough for it to be discussed so often!) but I just had to rant a little bit to people that get it. I'm mad my friends wasted their time on such bad information and even more mad that so many other people that don't know better are getting bad information.