Agency question checklist

What the fee buys, and who does the work

Two firms can describe a program almost identically out loud. Written down, their “included” turns out to cover different things.

• Which services does the fee cover, listed individually rather than as a program?

• Which of those are performed by a third party, and who selects and pays that party?

• Who is our named contact, what are their qualifications, and what happens when they are unavailable?

• How many families is that person carrying at once?

• Which responsibilities stay with us throughout?

Money, stages and what comes back

• What is excluded from the quote that we should expect to pay anyway?

• Which payment falls due at which stage, and against what trigger?

• If we withdraw at each stage, what is refundable and within how long?

• Where is our money held before it is spent, and in whose name?

• When a cost exceeds the estimate, who has to approve it before it is incurred?

The surrogate’s own position

A program is usually judged by what a firm does when one of these actually happens.

• How are candidates recruited, and what do you tell them about us?

• What medical, psychological and background screening applies, who performs it, and who pays?

• Does the surrogate have her own lawyer and her own independent advice before signing?

• Has she been pregnant before and does she have her own children, and what has she been told about future fertility?

• At what points can she withdraw, and what does that do to our money and our timeline?

The medical program and its limits

• Which clinic, which laboratory, and who is clinically responsible?

• How many transfer attempts does the quoted program include?

• What is the stated position on selective reduction and who decides?

• How do you limit the risk of a multiple pregnancy, and does that change the cost?

Legal work, and who instructs whom

• Which law firms are involved, in which jurisdictions, and for which specific documents?

• Are we free to instruct our own lawyer, and does the fee assume we will?

• Which order or registration will make us the legal parents, and in whose name does the child exist until then?

• Is the agreement itself enforceable where we are, and if not, what protects either side?

When a cycle fails or the program ends

• If there is no pregnancy after the included attempts, what happens to the fee and what comes next?

• If a pregnancy ends, who covers the surrogate’s medical and related costs, and for how long?

• If the surrogate’s health is affected, what has the program committed to and what has it not?

• If your organisation stops operating, what happens to our funds, our embryos and our file?

Claims you can check

A figure a firm quotes about itself is advertising. Write it down anyway, and put beside it something you can check without going back to them.

• Under what registration, licence or regulation does the organisation operate, and what is its number?

• How many programs have you run here, and over what period?

• Can we speak to previous families directly, rather than to families you have selected for us?

• Will the answers to everything on this list arrive in writing, and can we keep them?