[Clive McDonald]

apart from everything said by everyone else, there is also a trend for people to start directory businesses nwh, i believe there is a franchise called local trader and the deal sounds a bit like what they offer.

a few months back squeaky (he's a guy who used to post on here) had an almost identical story. It was free for the first three months and he was only cleaner.Well it must have worked because he doesn't post anymore because he's too busy.

[Central Window Cleaners]

Ask them to send you a copy of one of the old mags with the last guys ad in it and give him a call. 

Is it a charity guide or a parish mag type mag?

I advertise in a regional parish mag and have had about £400 of monthly work from it as well as gutter and conservatory work.

[Nathanael Jones]

I once nearly got caught out with one of the charity ones, even got to the point where they sent me a proof of a wall planner with my ad on it, when they asked for payment, I just had a feeling something was wrong, so I did some digging and turned out it was a scam.

http://www.safefromscams.co.uk/PublishingBusinessScams.html

I had that very same call last week!
The company scamming had been on the TV show "Buyer Beware" only a couple of weeks before (Thank goodness my missus watcher rubbish TV!) so I copped it straight away. He did sound VERY convincing & genuine tho,.. if it hadn't been for that I might have fallen for it.

[Klean07]

I seem to have had a lot of calls like this since signing up for Yell and Yellow Pages. The latest one said it was a local magazine that was distributed through all the big Supermarkets etc. They must think we're multi millionares or something.