BUYER BEWARE. I would not recommend working with Horton or its parent company JLB. If you are considering them for website development, hosting, or anything else, please do your diligence thoroughly on the front-end. Understand the terms of your relationship with them - what they will be doing for you, who your point of contact is and how to get them on the phone (there is very high employee turnover), how much their services cost (most are way overpriced), how you will be charged, what level of access you will have to your files (you should have full admin control, although they will prevent that), and what the costs are for leaving them if you are not happy with their services (this is particularly important). If you do decide to work with them or are currently working with them, look closely at each and every invoice you receive--- make sure the services being provided to you are explicitly stated on the invoice. Generally they are not, and this is one of many ways they actively try to overcharge you.
While the firm's marketing is cute (Horton) or seemingly professional (JLB), don't be fooled - these are not trustworthy companies in spite of all the clients they promote on their websites. They may act very gracious at the start of your relationship with them, but once you begin to question their billing or try to get the services you pay for, things change -- it's difficult to get a response from them (you have to submit requests through a general email address to speak to someone and getting a reply can take days if at all). When you do get a response, it will usually be electronic. If you finally get someone on the phone, you will start to notice that their tone changes. It's really a downward spiral from there. When you finally have had enough and decide to leave, that's when things get really tough for you - they require you to pay a big termination fee and sign bizarre Separation & Release agreement (even if you never signed a contract on the front end) that prohibits you from saying anything bad about them. Only once the fee is paid and the agreement is signed will you receive access to your website files.
While you will indeed find plenty of positive reviews online about their services, I truly believe many of those are made up, and the reason you don't see more negative reviews is because unhappy customers who leave are scared to say anything because they have to sign the Separation & Release agreement referenced above. If you spend a little time digging online for critical reviews, you will find them --- customers, vendors and former employees alike accusing these businesses and their owners (Ken Royer and now "silent partner" Ned Horton) of being shady at best and fraudsters at worst.
Believe me, there are WAY better and safer options than working with these businesses. read more
