A child car seat widely sold by High Street retailers has failed a product tester’s safety simulation, with potentially devastating consequences.

In shocking footage, released by independent product testers Which?, the Recaro Optia car seat appears to comes off and flies forward with a ‘high risk’ that in a real-life accident ‘a youngster could suffer serious injury.’

Since the findings by Which? the manufacturer Recaro has taken the precautionary measure to stop the sale of the models of its toddler seat – the RECARO SmartClick and RECARO Optia until further notice.

The Group 1 seats designed for children 9kg to 18kg (that’s around one to four years old) were widely sold at retailers including Argos and Toys R Us.

In a statement a Which? spokesman said: “During our latest child car seat crash testing, this seat experienced a failure which would result in its test score being instantly lowered to a Don’t Buy score.

“During the frontal impact crash tests, the child car seat broke from the Isofix base.

“There is a high risk, in a real accident, that if this occurred a child could be seriously injured, as could anyone who was hit by the loose child car seat.”

Sales of the RECARO SmartClick and RECARO Optia have been suspended as a 'precautionary measure' according to the manufacturers.
Sales of the RECARO SmartClick and RECARO Optia have been suspended as a 'precautionary measure' according to the manufacturers.

This is the second time a Recaro child car seat has been under scrutiny as last year a similar issue with the Fix Base to which Recaro responded and replaced the Isofix bases concerned.

But the successor to this base, the Recaro SmartClick, appears to have a similar issue, according to the Which? findings.

Recaro said in a statement: “At this point we cannot give any statement with regards to the cause. In all of our performed internal and external tests, which far exceed the regulatory requirements, the described issue never occurred.

"We must identify and understand the root cause before being able to decide on possible next steps.

“With regards to consumer safety we want to ensure that none of the products tested by Stiftung Warentest are being sold, until we have fully investigated the test results published by Stiftung Warentest.”

The manufacturer confirmed it has stopped the sale of RECARO SmartClick and RECARO Optia until further notice.

Anyone affected can contact Recaro for advice on 01926 484111.