Trade

Q: Is it permissible to sell gold and silver plated jewellery?

Q: In some restaurants, if a person orders a dish and wishes to share it with someone else at his table (e.g. a husband and wife order a dish and both wish to share it instead of ordering separate dishes), the restaurant will charge the second person a ‘plate sharing fee’. If the second person does not pay this fee, they will not be allowed to share in the dish of the first person. In Islam, is it permissible to charge a plate sharing fee?

Q: Can you work for a shop which shows their clients samples of blinds and thereafter they acquire it for them? I don't think the shop owners understand that it is not permissible for one to sell something which one does not possess.

Q: I would like to know if a restraint of trade agreement is permissible in an Islamic sale.

Example: I am selling my cellphone business to Zaid. In the sale agreement a clause is added that I, the seller, is not allowed to trade in the same field of business for a stipulated period (e.g. 5 years). Will such a clause be permissible? If not will the adding of such a clause nullify the entire sale? Or will the clause be impermissible and the rest of the sale be correct?

Q: I urgently need to know something before I fall into haraam dealings. Please tell me if my method of charging commission is permissible:

I have an online store where people can advertise their things on my website and I charge them on each successful transaction, so if something was sold for R100.00 I would charge R1.00 (1%)

According to the Hanafi mazhab we are allowed to take percentage based commissions from customers, I have collected numerous fataawaa on this Alhamdulillah. What I need to know is whether I can tell my customers this:

We charge 3% for any sales under R1 000, 2% for sales under R5 000 and %1 for sales under R10 000

Although no ambiguity remains and both I and the client knows how much will be charged at the end of the sale, I just need confirmation if is this permissible. See the case scenario below:

Sometimes the client will have something like "negotiable price" on his advert, so he would either sell it for R900 or R1 000 for example. Since I charge him 3% for sales under R1 000 and 2% for sales between R1 000 - R5 000, is this considered as ambiguity or is it permissible?

Another scenario:

Someone advertises an auction on my website. The price of the auction could be won at anything from R1 to R2 000 or more. Can I charge a fixed 3% on all auction listings so that no ambiguity remains as to what the seller will pay me? So that if the sale goes for R1 then I will get R0.03 and if it goes for R2 000 I will get R60

I am very cautious of falling into haraam activity and this is my income so I need it to be clean.

Q: A fertlizer called amino acid is prepared from the hair of humans, dog or any other animal. So we are planning to buy hair from salons and then sell to this industries who make amino acid from hair. Is it permissible?

Q: Whenever I buy something from outside of the UK with my debit card, my bank takes a purchase/transaction fee. I dont mind this. Is this allowed?

Q: I work at a sales position in a company. Is it halal for me to pass on a lead I got from a connection, to some other supplier which I cannot fulfil from my company and receive commission from that supplier when the deal is done.

Q: My father is 68 years old now. He was working as a manager at a government bank for more than 40 years. When he was in his 20's he joined the bank because of the financial problems which his family encountered. At the bank he served plenty of positions such as cashier, assistant manager, credit controller, risk manager, etc. He quit his job at this bank 8 years ago. Now he is working at our village in Baithuz Zakath and Baithul Maal organizations. I would like to present the following points:

• He has never given money for interest (Riba) for him

• He has never borrowed for interest (Riba) for him

• All what he done was he did his job at the bank.

• During his top management career, he was very interested in Islamic banking and tried to introduce Islamic banking system in his bank (At that time, there was no bank to conduct Islamic banking services. Very Recently, his bank started Islamic banking services to its customers. They used my father’s proposals and other documents to start this service)

• He did that job as his livelihood

• Till now, he gets pension from his bank (since his bank is a fully government owned entity, all the funds are directly coming from the treasury)

• He uses his knowledge in banking to uplift the Baithuz Zakath and Baithul Maal organizations in our city. (Many other villages are impressed with his Baithuz Zakath Organization Model. They meet him and get advices and support as well)

• He is very pious. He never misses any of his prayers.

Now I am writing my questions:

1. Is that pension money which my father gets from the bank haraam?

2. If it is haraam, what are the remedies ? (The money which he gets from Baithuz Zakath is not enough for him to meet his day to day needs.

3. Was his job (Banking Job) haraam? 

Q: Allied bank is giving an ATM card in which we can deposit money from any city and can get money from anywhere with using this card from the branch of that bank and there is no charges of depositing and transactions. There is no need for any account of this. We only have to create an ATM card once from an Allied bank.

My question is that, is this permissible in shariah (deen) or not to use this ATM card? There is no extra money required for depositing and transacting.