We have just learned about a forthcoming recall that affects the Chicco KeyFit infant car seat base. They have a manufacturing defect on a small number of bases where the riveting of the LATCH system doesn’t allow the consumer to properly tighten the base when installing using LATCH. There are no accidents or any issues reported. Chicco discovered the issues and immediately notified NHTSA to start the process of correcting and announcing to the public.
Chicco notified Babies R Us about the issue and they immediately pulled their entire inventory off the shelves to return to the manufacturer. This caused a mini panic prior to allowing Chicco and NHTSA to officially announce the issue to the public. It is likely the majority of their stock was not affected. They have told consumers there is a recall but have not offered any further information. NHTSA should be releasing an official statement by Wednesday June 4, 2008.
To determine if you have a seat that is affected you need to look at the Serial number on the box the base came in (stand alone or within a travel system) or on the sticker on the base itself. The serial # is actually the date it was manufactured. NOTE – the date reads the European way with the year 1st, then the month and then the day. See below:
The dates when affected product was manufactured are February 26, 2008 though March 17, 2008 (NOTE - this is an updated date range from the original posting). If your serial number date does not fall within that date range your base is okay and nothing needs to be done. If the date is within that range you should use the vehicle seat belt to secure the base in the car and not LATCH.
As usual, Chicco stands behind their product and will most likely be replacing anyone’s base that is affected by the recall. The official release from NHTSA and Chicco will explain how to get any affected bases replaced. Again, until that time the KeyFit bases should be installed using the vehicle seat belt.
In my opinion Chicco is handling this issue rapidly and appropriately. They notified NHTSA immediately and within hours began the correction process. I do not have any worries about the integrity of the KeyFit car seat base going forward. We will proudly continue to sell Chicco at Goore’s for Babies to Teens and http://www.goores.com/.
Richard Goore
http://www.goores.com/
Goore’s for Babies to Teens
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Thank you so much for posting this. We've been going crazy all day trying to find more info about this when we heard about it (we bought one of the impacted car seats). We hope Chicco promptly replaces our seat base so that we can install it using our latch system as intended.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your info about Kids car seat
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