Bring the Seat or Hire One? What to Sort Before You Book a Car for the Family

• Three questions decide the whole booking: how many bodies, how big the smallest ones are, and how much is coming with you.
• Bringing the seat and hiring one each solve a different problem, and the answer usually comes down to how you are arriving at the car.
• A bigger car is not automatically the answer, because the third row and the boot are competing for the same space.
• You cannot fix a seat or a boot at the kerb. Everything on this list gets sorted before you book.

You have booked the flights, the house and the dog sitter, and then someone asks the question nobody wants to own: so who is sorting out the kids’ seats? If that someone is you, welcome. This is the part of a family car hire that no booking form asks you about, and it is the part that decides how the first hour of the trip actually goes. Here is the whole decision, in the order it needs making.

The decision, in the reader’s own words

Bring your own seat, or use the hire company’s. That is the question, and it is worth saying out loud that both answers are correct, just for different trips.

Bringing your own gives you the seat you know. You know it fits your child, you know where the straps sit and you know its history, which is nothing to be casual about. It also means nothing extra to hire and nothing to learn on the day. The catch is the carrying. A seat is bulky and awkward, and whether it flies free depends on the airline and the route, so that is a question for the airline’s own page rather than a guess. And when you get there, you are still fitting a seat you know into a car you do not.

Hiring one means nothing to carry and one less thing in the boot, and for a lot of families that is the whole argument right there. The catch is that you get what they have. You fit it yourself, you have limited say over the model, and you will not have seen it before the day.

Notice what is not on either list: a right answer. A family flying in for a week with one child will usually hire. A family driving their own car to the hire counter, with a seat that is already fitted to their child’s exact size, will usually bring it. The decision is usually made by the trip, not by the seat.

The trip you are planning is a holiday. The seat question is admin, so keep it in the admin pile and get it done early, and it never gets the chance to become a story you tell for years.

If you are hiring one, five things to settle before you book

The booking form will not ask you any of these. Ask them anyway, because each one is a kerbside surprise you are choosing to skip.

One, say the child’s age and size, not just “a child seat”. That is the information that decides which type of restraint is right, and it is the single most useful sentence in your booking.

Two, ask for the seat to be added to the booking in writing. A seat that was “mentioned” at the counter is not a seat that was booked, and the difference shows up on the day you need it.

Three, ask who fits it. On most hires, the honest answer is you, and you want to hear that answer now rather than discover it at the kerb with a queue behind you.

Four, ask what happens if the seat does not suit your child on the day. This is the real risk. You are handed a model you have never used, and children have opinions about straps.

Five, ask whether the seat can move with you if you change vehicles, which matters on a one-way hire or a mid-trip swap.

One more thing, and it is the one people forget: requirements for child restraints are set by your state or territory, and they can differ. Check your own transport authority before you travel, and never take a threshold from a blog, including this one.

If you are bringing your own

The bring-your-own plan has its own short checklist, and it is mostly about the journey to the car.

Check the seat’s own instructions for whether it can be used on an aircraft, if you are flying. Check the airline’s current rules for carrying it on their own page, because they differ between carriers and between cabins. Pack the seat so you can carry it one-handed, because there will be a moment when your other arm has a child in it.

Photograph the seat and its label before you go, so you can show what it is if anyone asks. And do one thing before you leave home: practise fitting the seat in a car that is not yours. A seat you have only ever fitted in your own car is a seat you have never really fitted, and the back seat of a hire car is a different puzzle every time.

Fitting it in a car you have never seen

This is where most of the trouble happens, and it is always the same shape: the seat was available, and the fitting was not right.

What changes from car to car? The shape of the rear seat, where the anchor points are, how the belt runs, whether the headrests get in the way of a booster, and how much room the front seat loses when a rear-facing restraint goes in behind it. None of that is visible until the car is in front of you.

The method is short, and it is the same every time. Read the seat’s instructions before you touch the car. Put the seat in a position that is not in front of an airbag. Get the belt or the anchor tight enough that the seat moves less than a hand’s width at the belt path. Check the recline. And check the child’s straps every single time, because straps loosen and children grow.

One thing to notice while you fit it: the front seat usually loses room when a rear-facing restraint goes in behind it. The driver ends up further forward than they like, and on a long drive that is worth knowing before you set off rather than three hours in.

The sentence to remember is this: a seat that is in the car is not the same as a seat that is in properly. The difference between those two is the step people skip at the kerb when everyone is tired and the bags are still on the trolley.

How much car you actually need

Now the second half of the booking, and the one that surprises people: seats on a spec sheet are not seats you can use.

Count the people first. Then count the seats that are actually usable. A seven-seater with two child restraints in the second row may lose its access to the third row. A third row that folds into the floor takes the luggage space with it. And a driver’s seat is not a passenger seat in any vehicle being driven by someone in your group.

Then count the luggage in volume rather than in bags. A pram and a portacot are the two giants of family travel, and neither is shaped like a suitcase. What matters is the boot with all the seats up, because that is the version of the car you will live with.

Two more specifics catch people. The tailgate height, if a pram has to go in and out all week. And whether anyone needs a particular seat position for a wheelchair or a mobility aid, which is a booking conversation rather than a kerbside one. If a trailer or a bike rack is part of the plan, ask about a tow bar at booking time, because that is not a question that gets solved in a car park.

The trick that ties it together: work out the worst hour of the trip, which is almost always the airport run with everyone and everything in the car at once. Size the vehicle for that hour, not for the average day. It is the same lesson the site’s Are cruises a good choice for families and groups? What to know before you book makes about holidays in general: the trip decides the vehicle, never the other way round.

The counter questions, kept short

You have done the big work by now. This section is just the last four questions at the counter, and it takes two minutes.

Which seat have you allocated to us? Can I see it before I sign anything? Who fits it? And what is the process if it is wrong? Those four answers are the whole handover, and they take less time than finding a parking spot. It is the handover a Dandenong car rental company that hires across Greater Melbourne prepares for on every family booking.

If your worry at the counter is the money rather than the seats, that ground is already covered properly elsewhere on this site: Avoid these sneaky fees when you rent a car is where the fee conversation belongs, and this article is staying on seats and space.

And the standard to hold the booking to is simple. The answer to a good booking is a car that is already correct when you get there.

Before you book the car

The compressed version, so you can close the tab and get on with it.

Decide the seat question first, because it changes what vehicle you can book. Write the seat into the booking, in writing, and ask who fits it. Count people, then usable seats, then the pram, in that order. Size the car for the worst hour of the trip, not the average one. If you are bringing your own, check the airline’s rules on their own page and practise the fitting before you go. And give yourself real time at the counter, because fitting a seat properly is not a thirty-second job.

And one last nudge: if you are hiring the seat, ring the day before and confirm it is on the booking. Five minutes, and it is the difference between a seat waiting for you and a phone call from a car park.

The seat and the boot are the two things you cannot fix once you have driven away. Sort them at the kitchen table, and the first hour of the trip belongs to the holiday instead.

Sources consulted: your state or territory transport authority’s information on child restraints.