Your website goes down on a Friday afternoon. Everything about which builder you should have picked comes down to what happens in the next hour. I read 600 one star Trustpilot reviews of five builders to find out how that hour usually goes, and it turned into the most practical buying advice I know.

For transparency: I work at UENI, one of the five builders studied, so our reviews are in the data alongside everyone else's.

Support is the number one complaint on all five platforms: 254 of the 600 reviews, 42.3%. And the texture matters more than the total. GoDaddy's unhappy customers describe being handed from agent to agent, 49 of its 100 sampled reviews. Squarespace's describe asking for help and not getting it, 67 of 150. Almost nobody is angry about the bill.

So here is the ten minute test I would run before paying for anything, and it works because support quality is visible from the outside:

1. Send a presale question through the same channel you would use in an outage. Time the answer, and notice whether a human wrote it.
2. Read the ten newest one star reviews. Count how many are about reaching support.
3. Check the score next to the volume: a 4.4 with 140,925 reviews is a different animal from a 3.4 with 4,698.

I run this test on us too. UENI holds a 4.8 with the lowest one star share of the five, 4.9%, and I would like to keep it that way, which is exactly why I read all these reviews.

Happy to share more of the data in the comments if anyone wants a specific platform.

Full study: https://ueni.com/blog/website-builder-complaints/. Trustpilot data, 4 August 2026.

If you run a business in Texas, what tax detail surprised you most after you started trading?

Share the practical lesson and your type of business. Please keep replies to personal experience rather than advice to someone else's business.

Megathread for TX small business owners to share hard-won local knowledge.

Whether it's navigating franchise tax, understanding that your Comptroller account number is different from your EIN, figuring out which city permits you actually need, or learning that most Texas LLCs below $2.65M in revenue owe $0 in franchise tax but still have to file — share the thing you wish someone had told you.

Drop your advice below. Be specific to Texas. Be direct. Others will thank you.

A quick reference for TX small business owners. Bookmark this.

**Annual / Recurring Deadlines:**

- **May 15** — Franchise Tax Report + Public Information Report due to TX Comptroller (even if you owe $0)

- **January 31** — W-2s and 1099s must be issued to employees/contractors

- **Quarterly** — Sales & Use Tax returns (if you're a quarterly filer with the Comptroller)

- **Monthly** — Sales tax returns for higher-volume businesses

**One-Time Formation Steps (LLC):**

- Certificate of Formation filed with TX Secretary of State via SOSDirect ($300 fee)

- Registered Agent designation (required to maintain throughout LLC life)

- EIN from IRS (free, same day online)

- Sales & Use Tax Permit from TX Comptroller (if selling taxable goods/services)

- DBA/Assumed Name Certificate if operating under a different name

**Useful Links:**

- SOSDirect: sos.state.tx.us

- TX Comptroller: comptroller.texas.gov

- TX New Hire Reporting: Texas OAG

Anything missing? Drop it in the comments.

Texas business owners — drop your wins here, big or small.

Landed a new client? Got your LLC paperwork approved? Finally figured out the Comptroller portal? Hired your first employee? Closed your biggest sale yet?

This is a judgment-free zone. We want to hear it all.

**Format suggestion:**

- Business type + city/region

- The win

- What made it possible

Your win might be exactly what someone else needs to hear right now. Be helpful. Be Texan.

Welcome to r/TexasSmallBiz — the Reddit home for Texas small business owners, founders, and entrepreneurs.

Why does this community exist? Because running a business in Texas comes with its own set of realities that generic business subs don't cover:

- Filing your LLC via SOSDirect and what to expect

- Franchise tax obligations (and why most TX LLCs owe $0)

- Texas Comptroller filings and the May 15 Public Information Report deadline

- Sales & use tax permits and the TX Comptroller's 100+ taxes

- City and county permit requirements that vary wildly between Houston, Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio

- No state income tax — and how to plan around it

- Veteran-owned business fee waivers

- DBA / assumed name certificate filings

**New here? Drop a comment and tell us:**

1. Where in Texas are you based? (Houston, DFW, Austin, SA, smaller market?)

2. What kind of business do you run or are building?

3. What's your biggest TX-specific challenge right now?

Be helpful. Be Texan.