Renting a car seat with National rental

[KLRI]

Has anyone recently rented a car seat/booster seat with their National car rental? We'll be taking a trip in October with our DS (4) and DD (15 mos) and would prefer not to bring DS's car seat since he no longer needs one on the plane. I am concerned, though, about the quality and cleanliness of rental car seats as well as the procedure for obtaining the seat, etc. We use the National Emerald Aisle and are accustomed to picking out our car (we brought DS's car seat on prior trips b/c he needed it for the plane) and leaving--does anyone know how we would get the car seat /booster seat in this instance? Thanks in advance for your help!

Kristan

 

[Brian Noble]

I would (and do) bring mine. The rental seats often do not have their manuals, making it easy to mis-install. And, the rental company will not install it for you, even if you ask, due to liability concerns.

You don't need to carry it onto the plane. At the counter, ask for a "gate check" tag for the car seat, and fill it out. You then leave the seat on the jetway just outside the boarding door. The ground crew will put the seat in the luggage compartment, and will bring it back up to the jetway at your destination airport (sometimes after you get off the plane, but often it's there before you disembark.) If you don't want to schlep it through the airports, you can also check it as standard luggage; the counter agent will put it in a Big Plastic Bag, tie it off, and put a luggage tag on it. You have a slightly higher chance of not getting it back that way, but if you are on a direct flight and arrive at the airport in plenty of time, that chance is still pretty low.

 

[beattyfamily]

I bring my own too; I bought those small, half seat ones that are easy to bring.

If you bring your own you can check it with your luggage. I bought a car seat bag at Babies R Us to put them in (I have two booster seats that fit just right in it).

If you rent one, you will have to go to the counter. You cannot bypass the counter when renting a car seat. You will have no idea of the condition of them either (YUCK!) and it's an added expense.

 

[annabelle]

Don't rent a car seat!
1.) Car rental companies don't keep up with (and probably don't care) about car seat recalls or if their seats have been in wrecks (which makes a car seat hazardous to use).

2.) You'll be using a seat that you're not familiar with in terms of installing, ease of use,etc.

3.) Then there's the "ick" factor. Personally, I don't care about juice stains and cookie crumbs... but what you don't know is if there's puke, poop or pee on a seat... which again, a rental car company isn't going to be vigilant about.

Bring your own seat! You're better off! For the $6-$8/day fee they charge, you could buy a brand new seat anyway.

 

[KLRI]

You all are quick! You have also reinforced my general reluctance to rent a seat (I had not included my concerns about correct installation and past history of the seat in my prior post). We'll already have one car seat for our 15 month old and were hoping not to lug more stuff through the airport, but it is far better to be safe than sorry. Plus anything to avoid the rental counter--that's why we use the Emerald Aisle.

Thank you, Brian, for the tip about gate checking. We have gate-checked our stroller in the past but never a car seat. It is helpful to know that option exists in case we might have too many checked bags otherwise.

Thank you for your quick replies and sound guidance!

 

[Mainebound]

You all are quick! You have also reinforced my general reluctance to rent a seat (I had not included my concerns about correct installation and past history of the seat in my prior post). We'll already have one car seat for our 15 month old and were hoping not to lug more stuff through the airport, but it is far better to be safe than sorry. Plus anything to avoid the rental counter--that's why we use the Emerald Aisle.

Thank you, Brian, for the tip about gate checking. We have gate-checked our stroller in the past but never a car seat. It is helpful to know that option exists in case we might have too many checked bags otherwise.

Thank you for your quick replies and sound guidance!

We are using Emerald Reserve in late Feb and are bringing our carseats. We are bringing one high backed booster seat (use 5 point harness) for our 3 year old, a bag (Eddie Bauer) to pack it in, and sticking the regular booster (for our 5 year old) inside the bag if it will fit, inside our largest suitcase if not. Since we are checking our luggage, with judicious use of skycaps and porters, I don't anticipate having to "lug" them anywhere -- I'm on vacation!

Seriously, the costs of the rentals would be more than buying them new, and as other posters have said, they have unknown histories.