Or, are you thinking of investing in it, but you are skeptical if it is legit or just some sort of scam?
Based on my experience, I think it is legit.
I was first introduced to farmOn.ph when I was watching "DayOff" of GMANews TV in early 2015. I think that was in January.
The mechanics of the program (DayOff) is to choose from our ordinary filipino workers, give them a day off and the host will work there in their stead for a day.
On that episode, Boobay was on the farm of farmOn.ph and there I got curious.
Imagine, I used to play Farmville when I was in college and now, you can do that and earn money in REAL LIFE?!
It is clever of them to incorporate a game to their business, considering that their business is in agriculture.
They were also featured in State of the Nation with Jessica Soho,and Balitanghali (both from GMANews TV), Solar News channel, Philippine Daily Inquirer and in an ABS-CBN show, I think that was "Tapatan with Tunying"?
When I registered to them, it was open for registration for 5th cycle.
The steps to register back then was:
1. Send an email to admin@sproads.com and farmon.ph@gmail.com the following details:
Name
Address
Contact No.
The kind of crop you are going to invest to and the no. of plot
Just check their website's (farmOn.ph) "Our Products" section to examine and decide which crop you are going to invest to. The cost for each crops differ and so are their no. of plants.
For example, for Okra, investing 1 plot costs P1,500 with 200 plants.
For Green chili, 1 plot cost P3,500 with 133 plants.
(I took this photo after the registration period, so all the crops are sold out.)
The harvest time and % of profit differ also.
(UPDATE: Their website has improved and so are their process of registration too. Just check it out during the next registration period.)
2. Within 3 working days, you will receive their email of approval and the attached contract with the details of how you will send your investment money to them.
Payment should be made within 3 days upon receipt of this email.
3. After paying, send them an email with the proof of payment. I pay by depositing in their BDO account and attaching the deposit slip in my email to them. I always ask for an acknowledgement email from them just to make sure they have receive it. x'D
4. Just wait for a couple of days and they will send you your farmOn.ph account with a password (you can change this later on when you log in in their console).
Few days before the actual farming, you have to check your email for their notification of tagging. This means you have to choose a plot on the console and tag it as yours. This will determine whose crop will be sold first. If you aren't that quick, the last plots might be left for you. And you will have to wait longer for your investment to return.
What I mean is, if you invested for Okra which has a harvest time of 3-5 months, if your tagged plot was on the last, you may have to wait up to 5 months to receive your profit. While the others who are quick in tagging might have already received their profit in the 3rd month.
Yes, that's just how it is. (Too bad for those who has slow internet connection! Or those who rarely check their emails.)
(UPDATE: The console in facebook is no longer active. You can just check your farmOn account in their website after you log in. And there is no more tagging of plots (lucky you!). Their basis for giving profit is on who paid first for their investment. So all you have to do is register early and pay for early profit. Yay!)
5. Depending on which crop you invested, you just have to wait for the given harvest time for your profit. It will reflect on the console when your crop has been sold. All of the details like the crop sold, amount of sale and profit will appear there. (Again, the console is no longer active now. Account details can be seen in farmOn.ph website.)
And you just have to wait again for their email notifying you on the encashment details.
6. In our time back then, the encashment happens once a month, usually on the first week of the month. You will receive an email on how you will encash your money earned. For me, I chose to receive them in my bank account, so I sent them my details (Name, Bank account #, Amount of money to encash).
Based on my experience, if you sent your encashment request, let's say in January, expect to receive it in the first week of February. Because, of course, they will have to arrange all of the investors' encashment requests and process it by batch. Charges will be deducted too. Unless you are using PayPal.
After I sent my encashment request, I received an email that it has been approved. It was also stated there that I will receive an email with the attached deposit slip/money transfer slip confirming that the transaction was done.
Here's what I was disappointed for. I sent a request for August encashment in 2015. It was approved. All I have to do is wait for their email that the transaction was completed with the attached deposit slip.
But I never got an email from them confirming that the transaction was completed. I haven't received an attached deposit slip either. I emailed them for a couple of times asking for the deposit slip. They answered they will follow that up to profit-encashment dept, but never got back to me. I just knew my money got in when I checked my bank balance. The bank charge was P50, by the way. This January 04, 2016, I followed that up again explaining I have requested for the deposit slip for a couple of times last year but never got an update. There, finally, I received an email with the attached deposit slip for my August 2015 encashment.
I was really excited to refer farmOn to my fellow accountants and friends. But I couldn't, because I have no proof that I received an actual money from them. I posted my crop on my facebook, but there's nothing I can post to prove that I earned. Because of that, it restrained me from referring.
Also, another flaw is the ROI guide in their "Our Products" section. In green chili, you can see that the MINIMUM projected profit is 105.71%. FarmOners take half of the profit, by the way. Given that, you will expect MINIMUM profit of 52% within 10 months of farming, right? That is why I invested in green chili in the 6th, 7th and 8th cycle.
It turned out, the profit I got from my 6th cycle investment is 30%. They said it was because the profit depends on the sale of the crop. It differs on sale, they said.
In my point of view, they posted the ROI guide considering almost all of the circumstances that may occur during the planting season. Projecting is not easy. That involves a broad study of the field you are pursuing before you can project an income from that. Then they came up with the projected MINIMUM and MAXIMUM profit that one can earn in a certain crop. That is why I can't imagine earning BELOW the minimum profit, having in mind that this was projected under different circumstances that may come. And on top of that, it was the same in 5th and 6th cycle. 30% that is. How come? If there was an unforeseen circumstance in the 5th cycle resulting to earning below the minimum profit, haven't it been resolved in the next cycle? Let's see in the results of my 7th and 8th cycle's crops and I will update you.
Best choice that I can advise you, better choose the short-term ones. I will be going back to investing in Pechay again once the registration opens.
Oh and also before, there is no other option for you to reinvest your money earned. You have to encash and deposit it in the new cycle. But as they improved their website, there is now an option for the registered farmOners to reinvest their money. ;)
And for existing farmOners, registering for the new cycle is now made easy. It's all in their website now. And there's an option for you if you want to have a notarized contract. That includes an additional fee though.
What do you think?
Well whichever investment you choose, risk is always there.
It is up to you if you will take it or leave it.
I'll update this once I got a new information.
As for now, Happy Farming everyone~!
P.S.
It's been a year since I posted this and there's so many changes that FarmOn has made. You can view the following: 😊
- My FarmOn Experience....so far
- FarmOn's 14th Cycle | Scheduled Maintenance
- FarmOn | Frequently Asked Questions - Registration
- FarmOn | Frequently Asked Questions - Harvest & Withdrawal
- FarmOn | 13th Cycle Harvest (Watermelon)
- FarmOn | 15th Cycle Opening
- FarmOn | Website Not Working
- FarmOn | Is BACK~
- FarmOn | Opening of 16th Cycle
- FarmOn | October Encashment Request
well, it's a matter of understanding your risk. invest only the amount you are willing to lose.
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