(WSJ) – “Instantly, my heart just kind of stopped,” Gallozzi, who lives in Austin, Texas, said of the moment she learned the account was drained. Her hopes of expanding her family seemed to vanish with the money.

Like thousands of other couples who have navigated the intensely intimate, complex and almost entirely unregulated process of surrogacy, Gallozzi and her husband had placed those funds in escrow. They used a company that specialized in an obscure but vital component of the business: managing the large sums of money from parents to pay surrogates.

In Gallozzi’s case, she and her husband used Surrogacy Escrow Account Management, or SEAM, one of a handful of companies that have sprung up to fulfill this back-office role in the surging business of surrogacy, facilitating the medical expenses and fees paid out during the process. (Read More)