Lots of help needed!

Thank you to all in advance for reading this, it is appreciated.

I live in Europe and my daughter lives in Canada. I wanted to buy her an infant seat and pram (thinking Baby Jogger) as it comes highly recommended.

My situation is here we have isofix, we have access to award winning safe car seats and test results etc. I can't seem to find anything like that for Canada. I know every seat that is sold is a 'safe seat' but I also know that some seats are 'safer' than others.

How do I find which seats are better and I am well aware of the phrase "the seat that fits your car best is the safest seat".

I can't seem to find Isofix in Canada or Rigid Latch etc do they exist?

What ramifications would there be if I bring a seat from EU over for her to have?

She has a Subaru Outback with the Isofix attachments if that helps. There really seems to be limited seats to choose from there.

Thank you

Hi and welcome to the forum.

Quite simply, the ramifications of bringing a seat over include the risk of having it confiscated by customs, but also it is illegal for her to use here and she could be ticketed for using it and there is the potential for insurance ramifications should she be involved in a collision. (Not denial of payment to the child if the baby was injured, but the insurer could sue her for negligence in transporting her baby and recover the costs of what they had paid out for the child's injury.)

Additionally, Canadian standards are very strict and now have a requirement that has required many seats on the market to be re-designed or altered in order to pass the new standards. While I don't doubt that European seats are relatively safe, they are going to be different than Canadian seats and there could be substantial differences.

All Canadian seats come with UAS which is like Isofix, but has the anchors on a flexible webbing strap that a parent must tighten instead. This is actually more convenient in vehicles overall as the rigid latch doesn't always fit well in vehicles depending on where the anchors are placed. Some models of Subaru's likely wouldn't play nicely with rigid ISOFIX due to them being placed above the seat bite which could leave less of the car seat base in contact with the vehicle seat.

You are correct that all seats perform differently, but that doesn't mean that there is a safest seat. Perhaps one seat would perform better in one vehicle than another. Perhaps one seat does better in side impacts while another does better in frontal collisions. The bottom line is that you don't get to pick your collision and there is no way to know how your vehicle and child restraint are going to interact and what the resulting performance is going to be until that point. That's why we tell parents to choose the seat the best fits the vehicle and the child and that they can use correctly every time.

Seats brought over from Europe are very easy to identify at a glance so chances of her getting a ticket - at least in my province, would be quite high if she were to be pulled over - the lack of chest clip would be an instant give away. The additional problem is that no properly trained technician is going to touch a European seat, so if she did run in to problems regarding the installation or use, she would have nobody to turn to for help. She also wouldn't have any warranty nor would she receive notification if the seat happened to be recalled.


Strollers are perfectly legal to bring in to Canada, and I would expect that the same adapters that are available over here would work with an imported baby jogger stroller. The adapters available for them are universal, so she would be free to choose her own carseat that would work with the stroller.

Perhaps this might be a good solution?

Hi and welcome,

What year is your daughter's Subaru Outback?

Since your daughter is here, I'd buy the stroller here b/c if there is a problem, accessing the warranty there could be a problem. One of the sites that sponsors us has the Baby Jogger stroller, you might like to start there.

You can also pick a Canadian approved car seat there. Trudy already addressed why you need to buy a Canadian seat. Perhaps you can pick a brand/model that is similar to what you have there, so you feel more comfortable with it.

The soon to arrive Foonf has the rigid latch (for FF only) you were asking about. It is *not* a baby bucket, but what we call a convertible, so goes from 14# and 6months old, up to 45# RF and a similar height to the European seats you may be familiar with. So, perhaps you may want to go with a cheaper baby bucket and transfer baby over to something like this sooner rather than later. I thought that Clek did publish the test data, so that is also something you can compare to the seats you are more familiar with.

tam

I'm a self-described stroller nerd Of my strollers, I bought two in the US (I'm in Canada) and one In Europe. I've had no trouble importing (and - I hope I'm not jinxing things! - so far I've not been taxed or assessed duty). The one I bought in Europe is a Mutsy, and though they aren't common here (which is why I imported, of course) I haven't had trouble with service.

So, from a stroller perspective, I'd say this: there are some incredible options available in Europe that aren't on this side of the pond. Something like that would, IMO, be well worth importing. But if you go with a Baby Jogger (Or Bugaboo, or Mountain Buggy, etc), arrange to buy it here, as they are far more expensive in Europe. For instance, the BJ City Elite is C$500 in Canada, 600 Euros in Germany, and 400-450 GBP in the UK.

Thanks for the advice but it sounds like there are no reports that I can have access to which will advise me on the car seats that not only pass but exceed. In my line of work I am well aware that a pass of 55% is a lot different than a pass at 95%.

Why are Canada and the US so secretive about what seats actually perform better than others? As for Chicco I'm not interested in a company that has been heavily associated with child labour in China, makes their seats in China, and also takes US out of date seats and sells them to unsuspecting parents in 3rd world countries (middle east) for a higher price than in the US because there are no child car seat laws there. Even though they know there is a warranty due to the breakdown of plastics etc. The middle east has extreme heat and the inside of cars in insanely hot yet poor parents shell out a fortune thinking their kids are safe. As for Graco, not a fan never have been. Britax... I used some of their seats while living in Australia (safe n sound) but it seems they keep their best technology for the EU and because they don't have to spend the money to make sure they pass the safety tests in Canada with high marks they just make seats that pass. But really we will never know will we? So what other brands are left?

I'm not trying to discount what people are saying but I'm not a soon to be grandma who doesn't have a clue. I have been fortunate enough to live in many different areas of the world and have spent the last nearly 25 years of my life with a child in car seats. I still have 2 in car seats myself that will be an aunt and uncle at the age of 5 and 9. So I have seen a lot of seats in my lifetime. I just havent bought a child seat in Canada for nearly 14 years and I want to make an informative choice for my grandchild.

The car is a 2003 outback.

Can some one tell me what the tests in Canada are and what they consider a pass and a fail? Or at least guide me to a link?

FrauDrA said:

The one I bought in Europe is a Mutsy, and though they aren't common here (which is why I imported, of course) I haven't had trouble with service.

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That's a great point, I live close to the Canadian/American border and bought a few of my strollers in the US, *way* cheaper. Now that you mention it I did have a problem w/ one of my Maclarens and a local store here fixed it, but only after Maclaren US sent me the parts (to my PO box) b/c the stroller I had wasn't available here and Maclaren Canada didn't have the parts. So while a bit of work, it wasn't a problem for me. However, you have to be really careful about shipping. You want to ship things via regular Canada Post, *not* UPS or any other courier company as they have huge fees to bring things across the border.

If you are coming here and can carry an extra package, I'd look at a Maclaren, I've heard they are dirt cheap there, but I've paid $160 for a Quest in the US and $300 here.

tam

Unregistered said:

Thanks for the advice but it sounds like there are no reports that I can have access to which will advise me on the car seats that not only pass but exceed. In my line of work I am well aware that a pass of 55% is a lot different than a pass at 95%.

Click to expand...

I'm in the middle of moving and only have a moment, but I really wanted to hop into the forums and comment on this.

You're completely neglecting to acknowledge two really important factors--other variables are in play during a real world crash AND that a pass is a pass on a test that already represents crash severity that is greater than around 95% of all crashes...and once you look at those last 5%, crashes become those unsurvivable crashes where forces are just so severe that there's no surviving them.

So by this logic--in a sense our seats "pass" at a 95%. Whether or not one seat outperforms another is likely statistically insignificant. Where we can improve safety is generally where we fail to do so--the so-called weakest link in regards to child restraint effectiveness lies with the user and not with actual seat performance.

So while it's all well and good to be researching the "best" seat, you really need to acknowledge that the best seat is the one that the parent will use correctly every time, is appropriate for the child, and installs well in the vehicle.

-Nicole.

Others have dealt with the car seat issue, but if you want to send you daughter a unique to Canada pram, send her an Emmaljunga! Soooo beautiful and not sold here.

tam_shops said:

You want to ship things via regular Canada Post, *not* UPS or any other courier company as they have huge fees to bring things across the border.

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That's not quite accurate. Fed Ex Ground and UPS ground, yes, have outrageous brokerage fees. Their air options generally include all brokerage fees, but are more costly.

DHL has very reasonable brokerage fees. I get stuff from them all the time from the U.S. and their fee is comparable to Canada Post.

FrauDrA said:

I'm a self-described stroller nerd Of my strollers, I bought two in the US (I'm in Canada) and one In Europe. I've had no trouble importing (and - I hope I'm not jinxing things! - so far I've not been taxed or assessed duty). The one I bought in Europe is a Mutsy, and though they aren't common here (which is why I imported, of course) I haven't had trouble with service.

Click to expand...

Are you getting them shipped to you? I've bought 5 or 6 strollers outside of Canada and had them shipped via postal service to me and have had to pay GST/PST on every one. No duty luckily though! But something for the OP to keep in mind if she doesn't want her daughter having to pay tax and a fee when it arrives at her door.

As for warranty, I also had no trouble with Mutsy or Mamas & Papas. But Valco and Baby Jogger make you pay the shipping cost for new parts. Free shipping is only available to those who purchased their stroller in the country where their shipping address is.

Warranty was also fine with UppaBaby, but at the time I had one, they didn't have a Canadian distributor (not sure if they do now).


Sent from my iPhone using Car-Seat.Org

bubbaray said:

Others have dealt with the car seat issue, but if you want to send you daughter a unique to Canada pram, send her an Emmaljunga! Soooo beautiful and not sold here.

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Agreed! I almost bought one in Iceland, and I still regret that I didn't.

TechnoGranola said:

That's not quite accurate. Fed Ex Ground and UPS ground, yes, have outrageous brokerage fees. Their air options generally include all brokerage fees, but are more costly.

DHL has very reasonable brokerage fees. I get stuff from them all the time from the U.S. and their fee is comparable to Canada Post.

Are you getting them shipped to you? I've bought 5 or 6 strollers outside of Canada and had them shipped via postal service to me and have had to pay GST/PST on every one. No duty luckily though! But something for the OP to keep in mind if she doesn't want her daughter having to pay tax and a fee when it arrives at her door.

As for warranty, I also had no trouble with Mutsy or Mamas & Papas. But Valco and Baby Jogger make you pay the shipping cost for new parts. Free shipping is only available to those who purchased their stroller in the country where their shipping address is.

Warranty was also fine with UppaBaby, but at the time I had one, they didn't have a Canadian distributor (not sure if they do now).

Sent from my iPhone using Car-Seat.Org

Click to expand...

Those I bought in the States I had shipped to Point Roberts and picked them up there. One was a Mac, the other a Bugaboo Bee+ (I "needed" it for a trip and it had just been released in the US). Even though the Bee was ~$650, and I had all the receipts ready, assuming I'd need to pay HST and duty, Canada Customs didn't assess duty.

The Mutsy was a different situation. We bought it while visiting my ILs in Germany, and had the store ship it home. Two reasons for that: to avoid German VAT, and simply because the store needed to order it for us We had. To fill out extra forms for CanadaCustoms and have them checked/stamped/whatever when we landed back in Canada; these were to ensure the stroller was accounted for in our out-of-country exemptions. As it happened, the stroller was delivered a couple of hours after I had the baby. My parents were here and they received it (DHL, I think?). I *think* they had to pay something, but then we submitted the form we had dealt with at the airport and were fully refunded. The whole value of the pram plus accessories was something like $1,500.