National Highway Traffic Safety Administration February 1, 2008 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

In response to Section 14(g) of the Transportation Recall Enhancement, Accountability, and Documentation Act, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration established a yearly ease of use assessment program for add-on child restraints. Since the program was established, the most notable improvements have been made to child restraint harness designs, labels, and manuals. On November 23, 2007, the agency published a notice seeking comment on revisions to the program. This notice summarizes the comments received and provides the agency's decision on how we will proceed. The agency has decided to enhance the program by including new rating features (the design aspects that are being evaluated) and criteria (the questions that evaluate the feature), adjusting the scoring system, and using stars to display the ease of use rating. We anticipate that these program changes will result in a more robust rating program for consumers while continuing to encourage manufacturers to refine current features and in some cases, install more features that help make child restraints easier to use.