Since you are doing form validation and using the progress bar, you need to set the value of MM.returnValue to true or false to identify if the form can be submitted or not. I've added a function for that and the page appears to work properly now... see lines 273-275 and the lines that reference framework_load_plugin_url to see the changes I had to make. 
Hello Ray,
thanks for your help.
Since the problem is the progress bar I would remove it. Iis there a valid alternative to it? Example: disable the submit button until the form is submitted?
TIA
tony


