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Saturday, August 25, 2018

15 Problems Commonly Experienced By OFWs

The common goal of most Filipinos who travel and work abroad is to provide a better future for their family. They often disregard leaving their loved ones behind for the sake of better monthly pay provided by their overseas jobs, but of course, it costs a lot in different aspects.
True enough there are overseas Filipino workers (OFW) who succeeded in their chosen path but it is not a guarantee that everyone who will choose the same will harvest the similar result. Sad to say, there are many OFWs who return back to the Philippines as broke as before or even worse.
According to statistics,  there are around 10 million OFWs in the world located in 170 countries, with over a million in Saudi Arabia alone, followed by Japan, Hong Kong, the United Arab Emirates and Taiwan and still growing.
OFWs are most vulnerable to problems which include the usual news menu of abuse and maltreatment we read almost every day.

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High placement fees
OFWs in their willingness and great enthusiasm to go abroad, they will produce money and pay for whatever their recruitment agencies ask. Some of them are deeply indebted and has sold their properties and valuables due to high placement fees dictated by the recruiters.

Employer maltreatment and abuse
Maltreatment and abuse are common to the OFWs who are working as household service workers. Some OFWs are luckily get rescued but for some OFWs who came home inside a wooden box, it is very tragic.

Broken families due to an extra-marital affair 
The culprit that many people blame why they had extramarital affair abroad is homesickness and they are fighting it the wrong way. Miscommunication can also be a factor. Nevertheless, the results are very destructive to the family.

You can avoid this by maintaining consistent and meaningful conversations with your spouse and children even when you are far.

 Culture shock
For an OFW who had been deployed in an unfamiliar territory with diverse culture, many OFWs suffer culture shock. The things you can normally do in the Philippines might not be right in your host country. The language barrier is also a problem but not for long. Filipinos can easily overcome such problems due to our ability to adapt and adjust to our environment. Eventually, we can feel at home over the course of our contract in the country we are at.


 Scams
OFWs are often the target of scammers given the notion that OFWs are rich. Some OFWs who wanted to have a way to earn more through investments are being victimized by related scams like pyramiding and multi-level networking scams. Some others are getting blackmailed and extorted online with a threat to expose their private videos or photos they willingly made out of extreme boredom. There are also others who had fallen victim to people they knew online and they easily trusted without knowing about their true evil intentions.
Contract switching
Have you experienced being asked to sign another contract which offers less salary than what you have signed before your deployment? This is a common practice among recruiters and employers. Aside from smaller pay, they will cut off your privileges such as overtime pay, weekly day-off among others and you cannot do anything about it especially if you are illegally deployed by un-accredited recruiters.
 Being unable to save
When an OFW received their salary, it often slip-off their hands and will not stay for even a day. They will head straight to the remittance center and leave a small amount for them and send all the remaining to their family back home. Not that they do not realize the value of saving, it's just that they find it difficult to do so. The sad truth is that many OFWs even caught in neck-deep debts and coming home broke after years of working overseas. 
Homesickness
This happens not only to newbie OFWs but even for those who had been traveling and working back and forth overseas. To think that there are many ways to communicate with our family through modern technology, we still long for the physical presence of the person or things we miss.

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Being jailed for offenses they did not commit
It is a sad story that not all inside the foreign penitentiaries are guilty. Many of them are behind bars due to conviction on crimes they do not commit.
Illegal Recruitment
Due to lack of knowledge and proper information and failure to consult with the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), many OFWs fall prey to illegal recruiters.

Plunging value of the Philippine Peso
Lately, the value of Philippine peso seems to dive. Next, to the salary, the second most important thing for the OFWs to know is how much is the current exchange rate. If the exchange rate is down, you can see it on the face of the OFW. It could be positive because the value of the money they will receive may be higher. However, it means higher prices of commodities and even though the value becomes higher, it will definitely not enough to meet their needs. That is why it pays to learn how to invest properly and grow a profitable side business. This ensures you of a passive income that you can count on whenever the country’s economy adversely affects your household income.

 Getting caught in political and natural disasters abroad
Political unrest or natural disaster is inevitable and out of our control. However, if the OFW is wise enough and saved for their future, the effects of these sort of problems could be minimal to none.

Difficulty in getting assistance from consular and embassy officials 
The reason may be either the OFW is deployed in a remote area or the Philippine embassy in his country has limited manpower and so they are unable to attend to all OFWs seeking assistance.

Family problems back home
An OFW may experience such problems and the burden even grows heavy with the thought that you were not there to address the problem personally.

  Failed family business
OFWs, because they are not present physically, they entrust their hard-earned money to their relatives or spouses in good faith that it will be invested properly and used wisely. But due to lack of research and proper business planning, investments fail.

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There may be more problems that the OFWs encounter that are not mentioned here. However, these are not enough to keep Filipinos from seeking employment opportunities abroad. .
Filed under abuse and maltreatment, filipinos, Hong Kong, Japan, ofw, overseas Filipino workers, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, the United Arab Emirates, Travel, Work Abroad, 
READ More:
What is the main reason why many Filipinos decided to leave their beloved family behind and work abroad? It is to earn more in order to be able to give their family the best possible future they can give. To buy the things they need, to have their own house to call their home, etc. The overseas Filipino workers (OFW) are usually breadwinners supporting even their extended families as well. The remittances the OFWs send to their loved ones used to be enough to pay their bills, mortgages and even a little extra for them to go to the mall and enjoy. Today, the families of the OFWs are experiencing difficulty in stretching their budget for the whole month due to the high prices of everything. From basic commodities, transport fares, school supplies, etc. Advertisement Godofredo's wife is an OFW in Malaysia. She needed to work there because the family cannot rely on his salary as a "barangay tanod" alone. They use the remittances they receive from his OFW wife for the education of their children, while his salary from his local job is used to pay their electric and water bills. Gina also experienced difficulty in making ends meet and forced to transfer her children to a public school because the remittances sent by her OFW husband is not enough anymore for their expenses. The remittances sent by OFWs abroad is considered the redeeming grace for the Philippine economy by helping stabilize the country's dollar reserve. Ads The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said that the OFW remittances had been slowing down and this year was the slowest flow of cash remittances in the past seventeen years. It is due to the repatriation program of the government, according to the BSP. From $13.8 Billion from January to June last year, OFW remittances had slightly gone up to $14.2 Billion at the same period this year. The government said headline inflation rate went up to 4.6 % in May as compared to 2.9% last year mainly caused by price increases in fish and seafood, fuel, lubricants, bread, and cereals. Average inflation at 4.1 %, higher than the government’s 2 - 4 % target for 2018. Due to the price hike, OFWs are encouraged to send at least 20% more of their usual remittance for their family to cope up with the experienced inflation, at least until the prices stabilized. Ads While OFWs do their best to provide for heir family back home, the latter also need to learn to value their sacrifices and hardships by spending the remittances wisely. It is important for them to know how to spend the remittances wisely as a way of helping their beloved OFW.
What is the main reason why many Filipinos decided to leave their beloved family behind and work abroad? It is to earn more in order to be able to give their family the best possible future they can give. To buy the things they need, to have their own house to call their home, etc. The overseas Filipino workers (OFW) are usually breadwinners supporting even their extended families as well. The remittances the OFWs send to their loved ones used to be enough to pay their bills, mortgages and even a little extra for them to go to the mall and enjoy. Today, the families of the OFWs are experiencing difficulty in stretching their budget for the whole month due to the high prices of everything. From basic commodities, transport fares, school supplies, etc. Advertisement Godofredo's wife is an OFW in Malaysia. She needed to work there because the family cannot rely on his salary as a "barangay tanod" alone. They use the remittances they receive from his OFW wife for the education of their children, while his salary from his local job is used to pay their electric and water bills. Gina also experienced difficulty in making ends meet and forced to transfer her children to a public school because the remittances sent by her OFW husband is not enough anymore for their expenses. The remittances sent by OFWs abroad is considered the redeeming grace for the Philippine economy by helping stabilize the country's dollar reserve. Ads The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said that the OFW remittances had been slowing down and this year was the slowest flow of cash remittances in the past seventeen years. It is due to the repatriation program of the government, according to the BSP. From $13.8 Billion from January to June last year, OFW remittances had slightly gone up to $14.2 Billion at the same period this year. The government said headline inflation rate went up to 4.6 % in May as compared to 2.9% last year mainly caused by price increases in fish and seafood, fuel, lubricants, bread, and cereals. Average inflation at 4.1 %, higher than the government’s 2 - 4 % target for 2018. Due to the price hike, OFWs are encouraged to send at least 20% more of their usual remittance for their family to cope up with the experienced inflation, at least until the prices stabilized. Ads While OFWs do their best to provide for heir family back home, the latter also need to learn to value their sacrifices and hardships by spending the remittances wisely. It is important for them to know how to spend the remittances wisely as a way of helping their beloved OFW.
What is the main reason why many Filipinos decided to leave their beloved family behind and work abroad? It is to earn more in order to be able to give their family the best possible future they can give. To buy the things they need, to have their own house to call their home, etc. The overseas Filipino workers (OFW) are usually breadwinners supporting even their extended families as well. The remittances the OFWs send to their loved ones used to be enough to pay their bills, mortgages and even a little extra for them to go to the mall and enjoy. Today, the families of the OFWs are experiencing difficulty in stretching their budget for the whole month due to the high prices of everything. From basic commodities, transport fares, school supplies, etc. Advertisement Godofredo's wife is an OFW in Malaysia. She needed to work there because the family cannot rely on his salary as a "barangay tanod" alone. They use the remittances they receive from his OFW wife for the education of their children, while his salary from his local job is used to pay their electric and water bills. Gina also experienced difficulty in making ends meet and forced to transfer her children to a public school because the remittances sent by her OFW husband is not enough anymore for their expenses. The remittances sent by OFWs abroad is considered the redeeming grace for the Philippine economy by helping stabilize the country's dollar reserve. Ads The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said that the OFW remittances had been slowing down and this year was the slowest flow of cash remittances in the past seventeen years. It is due to the repatriation program of the government, according to the BSP. From $13.8 Billion from January to June last year, OFW remittances had slightly gone up to $14.2 Billion at the same period this year. The government said headline inflation rate went up to 4.6 % in May as compared to 2.9% last year mainly caused by price increases in fish and seafood, fuel, lubricants, bread, and cereals. Average inflation at 4.1 %, higher than the government’s 2 - 4 % target for 2018. Due to the price hike, OFWs are encouraged to send at least 20% more of their usual remittance for their family to cope up with the experienced inflation, at least until the prices stabilized. Ads While OFWs do their best to provide for heir family back home, the latter also need to learn to value their sacrifices and hardships by spending the remittances wisely. It is important for them to know how to spend the remittances wisely as a way of helping their beloved OFW.
What is the main reason why many Filipinos decided to leave their beloved family behind and work abroad? It is to earn more in order to be able to give their family the best possible future they can give. To buy the things they need, to have their own house to call their home, etc. The overseas Filipino workers (OFW) are usually breadwinners supporting even their extended families as well. The remittances the OFWs send to their loved ones used to be enough to pay their bills, mortgages and even a little extra for them to go to the mall and enjoy. Today, the families of the OFWs are experiencing difficulty in stretching their budget for the whole month due to the high prices of everything. From basic commodities, transport fares, school supplies, etc. Advertisement Godofredo's wife is an OFW in Malaysia. She needed to work there because the family cannot rely on his salary as a "barangay tanod" alone. They use the remittances they receive from his OFW wife for the education of their children, while his salary from his local job is used to pay their electric and water bills. Gina also experienced difficulty in making ends meet and forced to transfer her children to a public school because the remittances sent by her OFW husband is not enough anymore for their expenses. The remittances sent by OFWs abroad is considered the redeeming grace for the Philippine economy by helping stabilize the country's dollar reserve. Ads The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said that the OFW remittances had been slowing down and this year was the slowest flow of cash remittances in the past seventeen years. It is due to the repatriation program of the government, according to the BSP. From $13.8 Billion from January to June last year, OFW remittances had slightly gone up to $14.2 Billion at the same period this year. The government said headline inflation rate went up to 4.6 % in May as compared to 2.9% last year mainly caused by price increases in fish and seafood, fuel, lubricants, bread, and cereals. Average inflation at 4.1 %, higher than the government’s 2 - 4 % target for 2018. Due to the price hike, OFWs are encouraged to send at least 20% more of their usual remittance for their family to cope up with the experienced inflation, at least until the prices stabilized. Ads While OFWs do their best to provide for heir family back home, the latter also need to learn to value their sacrifices and hardships by spending the remittances wisely. It is important for them to know how to spend the remittances wisely as a way of helping their beloved OFW.

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