I have been screwed so many times by people I have known liked and trusted in this business. Most of the time it is business people who get themselves in financial problems and then make deals they cannot come close to fulfulling. Then they either go out of business or blame my site for not converting.
Here is my simple rule I live by and recommend, do not pre-pay for anything unless it is a well established advertising type biz and even then never put out large sums, it is too much of a temptation.
Don’t mean to sound so negative but as this biz gets tougher and tougher we will see more desperate situations.
Brian