Yup.
Everything said above is correct and may save a lot of tears.
I ran a flying school for several years (good fun but I'm past it now!) and we refused to allow people to pay in advance - on the basis that if we had to disappoint students by cancelled bookings (aircraft gone tech for example) it would create bad feeling if they'd got lots of money tied up with us - and we would have spent it so no chance of a refund!
It's tempting for the school, but bad practice for them too.