Child safety advocates see rise in counterfeit car seat online purchases

SALT LAKE CITY (KIFI)—Child safety advocates at Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital are seeing more parents unknowingly buy counterfeit car seats online for their children, putting their kids at higher risk of serious injury if they crash.

These kinds of car seats are mostly bought online, often on websites of major national retailers through third-party sellers. They are usually much cheaper than major brands. 

“It’s hard to tell a car seat is counterfeit from a small picture online, and many parents think they found a great deal from a major retailer,” said Michelle Jamison, Community Health Program Manager at Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital. “Once they realize there’s a problem and try to return it, the site they got it from has already been taken down.”

They say there are several red flags to tell if a car seat is counterfeit. 

All car seats are required to have manufacturer’s labels on them that have the car seat’s name, date of manufacture, branding, expiration date, and model number.

Car seats must also have warning labels written in both English and Spanish to meet U.S. safety standards. 

Counterfeit car seats usually don’t have these labels or have them written in another language. They sometimes grammatical errors and that does not make sense.

If a car seat does not have a clip that would go over the child’s chest, it is not safe. Chest clips are required in the U.S., but not in every country. That’s why counterfeit car seats usually do not have them.

“If you determine that you have a counterfeit car seat, stop using it immediately and contact the retailer to notify them that they sold a counterfeit car seat,” Jamison said. “You may be able to recover the cost of the seat if you used a credit card or purchased through a major retailer.”