Business and Dealings

Q: I am 18 years old and will be completing my schooling this year. I am considering joining the army after I matriculate. Initially, after my training is complete, I will serve a certain amount of time in the army and may even be called upon to fight for the country (as is happening currently, where South Africa is fighting in certain other African countries).

My idea is that after some time, when I have sufficient training and experience, I will leave the army and become a mercenary (a soldier for hire). There is a great demand for mercenaries, especially in dangerous countries such as Iraq and other war-ridden countries like the African countries suffering from war lords, etc, and this profession is extremely lucrative.

Is this profession permissible in Islam?

Q: I earned money when I was young and bought a house on my brother's name. Now my brother is telling that this is his house and he will not give it to me.

Q: I am a single mother of a 5 years old child. I've been looking for jobs for my livelihood. However, I have been receiving interview calls from either banks or insurance companies mostly. I have no financial support from my ex husband or anyone else to take care of my daughter's expenses. I live in India so Islamic Banking is not prevalent. In this case, please advice if it is ok to work in a bank or an insurance company?

Q: I have a question regarding riba. I live in Germany and I want to rent a car for 12 months. My understanding is that all rental companies do not own the car, but they finance it from banks based on interest. As such, is it halal for me to rent cars?

Q: I am a shopkeeper who sells general merchandise.

Sometimes, people come to my store and want to use their debit card to draw money from my card machine. They will swipe their card in the machine, enter the amount that they want, and thereafter I will take the corresponding amount of cash from my till and give it to them while their bank deposits that amount in my account.

Can I charge them for this service? In other words, can I tell the customer to enter R205 into the machine while I give him R200 in cash? I will make R5 on the service of giving him the cash. Is this permissible?

Q: I own a manufacturing business where I take orders from customers and manufacture according to their specification. Once their order is prepared, they are notified and given a ten day period to collect the item from our warehouse.

The problem is that many customers delay in collecting their orders. This causes a problem for us as the uncollected orders take up space in the warehouse. In order to avoid this problem, we want to stipulate, at the time the order is placed, that if goods are not collected within ten days, then a stipulated storage fee will be charged for every day thereafter. Is this permissible in Shari’ah?

Q: I am a dentist employed by the government in a clinic.

According to my contract, I am employed to work from 8am to 4pm. However, my supervisor sometimes tell me that I can go at 11 am. He leaves early and also tells me that I can leave early.

Although he is my supervisor, I do not know whether he has the authority to let me go early, as he is not my employer. Rather, I am employed by the department.

Is it permissible for me to leave early? If I do so, will my income be halaal?

Sometimes but not always, I am forced to leave early as the supervisor locks the clinic and leaves, so I am unable to attend to patients even if I remain. What should I do in such a case?

Q: I am a qualified vet and generally treat farm animals.

Sometimes, the farmer asks me to treat a pig that is sick. I will need to examine the animal and administer the necessary medication or treatment to it. Naturally, this will involve some physical contact with the animal.

I was told that even a pig is deserving of treatment as it is the creation of Allah, and all creatures should be shown kindness. However, I want Islamic guidance in this regard.

Is this permissible? Will the money earned through this service be halaal?

Q: Is it permissible to buy items that are being auctioned off at a bank auction, i.e. items that were repossed by the bank?

Q: A person had some haraam money many years ago which he got from friends where they all use to work. They took the money from their work place and divided among themselves. Now that person saved the money and mixed it with his halaal money and bought something. The portion of halaal money was 90 percent and haraam money was 10 percent.

Later he sold the thing and realised his mistake and repented for his act and decided not to do this again. He then moved to some other country and performed Umrah from his halaal money. He repented again and got the feeling to get rid of that haraam portion of money.

He gave that money as charity and had put some in iftaar box in a masjid which he regrets. He should not have put that in the iftaar box. He is not sure if his intention was for sadaqa or charity. But he sincerely repented and never earned haram money again.

Now after so many years, he is not sure if he has disposed of all that money or not. Can he take some money out from his halaal money and give some charity to people who collect charity money and buy food for poor families just to be on the safe side that all that portion of haraam is dispossed off?