Another bad car seat check experience!!

On Sat. I went to a car seat event at the local BRU. I wanted them to check the my frontier to be sure I did the belt path right. Well the first thing I am told is that I should turn my two year old around. I told the guy the seat goes to 35 lbs and her head is not near the top so I am fine. He checks it and doesnt say anything. I watch him as he tries to move the seats and they dont budge. He takes out my Como and checks the date on it and starts looking for recalls. Well there was a sticker over the date bc it was part of the first recall but was fixed and then I mention the most recent recall I got in the mail and he has no idea what I am talking about. He gets the guy above him and he doesnt know what I am talking about. My seat wasnt part of the recall but the guy in charge wanted to take my seat bc he didnt know the history, which I was trying to explain to him. Finally he cut the sticker off and found the manufacture date and was fine to let me keep it. So the original guy installs the seat. And then moves to the frontier, which was installed right :thumbsup: Uninstalls it and has me reinstall it. Checked the baby seat, all was fine there. I dont think he even took the base out. Well I go to put the kids in the car now and when he installed the como he tangled up the harness with the seat belt. He actually did this twice during the check. The first time I fixed it, then the other guy came over about the whole manufacture date and the seat was taken out and then put back it. So twice the guy put the seat it, not sure why he didnt make me do it, well it was in wrong and loose. So I fixed it and then told the guy. :thumbsdown: I dont think he liked that very much. It just made me really mad bc lots of people would have left with their seat like that!! I understand why people become techs now. If they ever hold a class around me I am so going to go!!

Yikes! Why would they consider not letting you keep your seat?? Can techs in the US actually take someone's seat away?

no - a tech cannot take someones personal property without their permission. I make people sign a waiver to destroy their property or if they are taking the expired/recalled seat, they sign something that says i explained that they should not use it but thathat they want it anyways (usually it's an infant bucket that the parents want to use for one reason or another outside of the car)

they can refuse to install it for you if they believe the seat is expired/recalled/not safe for one reason or another...

capeKO71 said:

no - a tech cannot take someones personal property without their permission. I make people sign a waiver to destroy their property or if they are taking the expired/recalled seat, they sign something that says i explained that they should not use it but thathat they want it anyways (usually it's an infant bucket that the parents want to use for one reason or another outside of the car)

they can refuse to install it for you if they believe the seat is expired/recalled/not safe for one reason or another...

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Okay, that's what we do here in Canada (I'm a tech as well, just haven't gotten my status thing changed yet) too...thought maybe it was different in the States or something.

If we are replacing the seat b/c it is unsafe (expired, missing parts). We keep the bad seat. No one has ever fought us on this. I thought one family was going to last week. It was a shield booster. They were upset we put the 4y, 42# in a highback booster.

I had a great seat check at Once Upon a Child yesterday. My tech's name was Sherri and she really knew her stuff! She was not familiar with my seat at first. (It's a Cosco Scenera, but from babies R Us) but when I told her the name, she was familiar (I figured she would be). She asked for our son's weight and was able to get the Scenera in tight, and showed me how to do it. Then let me do it. (I was very specific I needed to know since I'm flying with the seat in September and installing it on the other end). And gave me tips for how to install it on the airplane.

She checked Expiration date and the parts. And it really took a lot of work to install, but she was willing to do it. (And she installed first herself to make sure we could get it solid when I was having trouble). She knew about not needing 45 degrees for an older child too. Oh and she didn't give me any problems about Theodore being so old, just checked that the harness came from below his shoulders and let me know when the seat would be outgrown Rear-facing. And she even peeked at the install of the Marathon in the other car. She urged us to bring it back when we move it forward cause the Marathon can be tricky forward-facing

(And warned us about the danger of projectiles... which I know. I'll have to be better about that.)

Anyway, I was really impressed and hope I can get her for all of my install checks.

Oh and she figured out why the harness was being so hard to tighten -- it had gotten stuck on the recline stand. And was able to fix it! (I'd have had to uninstall to fix, and its such a pain to install...)

vonfirmath said:

d cause the Marathon can be tricky forward-facing

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I'm glad you had a good experience - and got the help you were looking for.

The above confuses me ab it. In my experience the MA is the easiest ff seat I've ever encountered. if anything - I've had a few issues with rf (with seatbelt.) I'm not saying that getting ti checked - or getting help is not OK - just that the statement is quite surprising.

Sceason1972 said:

I'm glad you had a good experience - and got the help you were looking for.

The above confuses me ab it. In my experience the MA is the easiest ff seat I've ever encountered. if anything - I've had a few issues with rf (with seatbelt.) I'm not saying that getting ti checked - or getting help is not OK - just that the statement is quite surprising.

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Maybe it is just her car - my SIL has had a heck of time with her MA in her volvo because the headrests in the outboard positions are immobile.