Has anyone had any dealings with www.uk-djs.net or www.urban-djs.net?

They are a dj agency and require a "fee" of £62 for one year (I was quoted) to be added to their website as a DJ.

£62 just to be added to the site? or £62 to be added to the site and guaranteed £xxx worth of bookings?. If it's just to be listed on the website with no guarantee of work, then I think it's a bit steep.

Before I pay for a listing on any website, I always find out

(i) How well the site rates on the major search engines for several different keywords which relate to the services my business provides. For example if I'm a mobile disco in manchester, I want a site which ideally appears in a generic search for "Mobile Disco" or "Mobile Disco + Manchester"

(ii) How many other DJ's are listed in the same area of my coverage

I think point (ii) is important, if I am paying money to be listed I would prefer to appear on a site that has few or any other DJ's in my area. This way there is more chance of somebody sending me an enquiry. I wouldn't consider listing on a site which has loads of links to DJs covering the same areas, because the chances of a client spending hours clicking links and sending enquiries to more than one or two businesses is pretty slim.

Most agents, in the conventional sense will only charge you a fee when they have got you a booking. So in other words, no bookings = nothing paid to the agent!. There have been many discussions on the forum as to whether agents should be charging DJ's any upfront fees just to go on their books.

Send me £62 and I'll add a link from my website to yours.

Ive emailed one of the members of the site who is listed, and paid his £62.

He says that he has had no work whatsoever from the agency. Occasionally they email about a venue 'looking for a dj' and expect him to do the rest, but he has never got any work from them, or done any gigs he's been emailed about. He said in his own words "its a rip off".

Well done for doing your homework, the most active thread here ever was about the very same topic, we had about 1000 views, and 700 posts in a 12 hour period.

Scrapped my previous post.

i frequently get advertiser agencys phoning me up etc, they never work .....have tried a few! at a big waste of time and money

The latest on friday was "Hello Mr Wall its Merseyside police here! (Thats got you worried first off) Then "would you like to advertise in our yearly magazine for 80 quid circulating all the police staff in merseyside....errrrr No thanks!!

Weren't "upfront fees" or "Pay us first, and we may find you some work" deals deemed to be illegal, or at least, sharp-practice? Or are they loophole-ing this somehow by claiming that its a "webmaster fee" (for adding a paying DJ to their site rather than an agency fee? (Like the old Sunday trading restriction work-around and the VAT on hot food workaround).