But soon they could be enquiring, 'Is there anybody there... who is vulnerable, a sceptic, or likely to sue?'.

New consumer laws mean psychics will have to add disclaimers before they attempt to make contact with 'the other side'.

Plans to repeal the Fraudulent Mediums Act next month and replace it with the new Consumer Protection Regulations have got the industry in a bit of a tizz.

Promises to raise the dead, secure good fortune or heal through the laying of hands are all at risk of legal action from unhappy punters.

Mediums say they will now be forced to add riders before they begin communicating with the spirit world.

One way round the new legislation could be to issue a disclaimer proclaiming it to be 'a scientific experiment, the results of which cannot be guaranteed'.

Successful medium Stephen Holbrook, from Wakefield, says the new legislation is a mixed blessing.

"In any area of entertainment, and I hate using that word, you are always going to get people who jump on the bandwagon, saying they can do things they can't.

"This will hopefully iron out anyone practising fraudulently in the industry, especially things like psychic hotlines that are often purely money-making enterprises.

"The genuine mediums out there will, by and large, welcome the law. But obviously it makes us all slightly more vulnerable."

The new law is aimed at protecting the public from scam artists who fleece us of millions of pounds every year.

The Office of Fair Trading has found that psychic mailouts offering spiritualist services in return for payment cost us £40m in 2006-7.
Online, telephone and TV psychic services are also big business.

As well as scores of mediums up and down the country there are also more than 300 spiritualist churches.

Until now, people who take mediums to court have had to prove fraud and dishonest intent to secure a conviction against them.

That has proved difficult and there have been fewer than 10 such convictions in the last 20 years.

But now it will be up to the mediums themselves to prove they did not mislead, coerce or take advantage of any 'vulnerable' customers.
Mediums and spiritualists fear the law change could leave them open to an avalanche of claims by sceptics.

As a result, they have formed a union – the Spiritual Workers' Association – in a bid to protect themselves from expensive legal action and have taken out collective indemnity insurance.

"We've got to restructure our wording," said Stephen Holbrook.
"The association have been very good at suggesting certain disclaimers and legal instructions that we should present before doing our demonstrations.

"I think calling it a scientific experiment undermines what we do but we need to protect ourselves.

"There are a lot of people out there who have it in for us and we'd rather do that than have a law suit filed against us."

A spokesperson for the Spiritual Workers' Association said: "First of all, if someone is not happy with any goods or service that they have paid out for, they will feel they have been conned.

"The difference with spiritual work is that it highly subjective. What may seem like a very general reading to one person may be excellent proof to the person who is receiving it.

"If you add to this the lack of real public education and knowledge about spiritualism and its practices then accusations of fraud could be very difficult to combat.

"Our ultimate aim is to offer the public a credible organisation that gives them a list of members to choose from who they know will not set out to defraud them.
"In other words – spiritual workers they can trust."

Jane Jackson, a medium from Methley, Leeds, said she was confident that 'geniune' psychics had nothing to fear from the law change.

"I don't think we really have much to worry about. Obviously there are sceptics out there but the people who come to see us believe in the spiritual world.

"There are fraudulent people in any business but the genuine ones should have nothing to worry about."

However, she does object to the idea of having to tell audiences that she is conducting 'a scientific experiment'.

"To me it's making us look as though we not doing it properly.
"No way do I feel it's an experiment. It's a personal thing and comes straight from the spirits.

"It's a case of having to because of the new law but it won't affect my business because I believe in what the spirits are telling me.

"If I didn't I wouldn't have a three-year waiting list of people wanting to come and see me."

John Field, from the Morley office of Government-run consumer advice service Consumer Direct, said it would still be tricky to prosecute a fake medium – despite the change in legislation.

"The difficulty with things like spiritualists is in terms of gathering evidence. Where there is a written promise it is far easier to show whether it is correct or not.

"For instance, mileage on a car bought from a garage is either right or not right. But spiritualism does not tend to work like that.

"We would ask people to contact us about specific individuals making promises they can't keep and we would advise them on any redress they might have.

"We can also pass their complaints on to Trading Standards officers to decide whether there is sufficient evidence for possible further action including prosecution."