Assalamu aleykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh,
I had open a registered studies sparing account for my daughter since November last year with a financial institution. I let them know at the beginning that my religious beliefs prevents me from dealing with interest. They told me it wasn’t interested it was investing in a fond.They told me they had a fond socially responsible for people like me and they assure me that many Muslims were investing in this fond… So I agree thinking it was halal. At the same time I opened a sparing account for myself thinking both accounts would be using the same fund. Then a few months later I investigated more and found that only my sparing account was using the social responsible fond. And this fond wasn’t dealing with many harm things but there was no mention of alcool so to be safe I decided to close it. And get rid of the money earned while keeping my capital.
But as far as my daughter’s account is concerned, the money was invested in a fond of fonds basically making money from loans the financial institutions has given people. So it was riba. I didn’t want to close it as it was a registered account and I would have lost the government incentives. So I decided to transfer it to a halal institution I found later.
Because the initial deal was that I would keep the account for 17 years, there are concellation fees. My question is: is it possible for me to pay they fees with the money aquired from the investment in the fond and get rid of anything less( it would be like giving them their haram money back while protecting my capital). Or should I get rid of the money in a other way and pay their fees from my capital?
Barakallahu feekum
Wa Alaykom il Salam Arielle,
You will most likely receive many opinionated answers on this however my take on such a situation would be as follows:
If the money you earned such as through Riba was obtained without any guidance or knowledge, you are permitted to use this past money and will take no burden and your affairs are with God. The best reference to this I can find in the Quran is as follows: Surah Al-Baqarah - 2:275 | Quran.com
Now, things will change SIGNIFICANTLY once you ARE aware of your wrongdoings therefore if you continue to take receipt of this money you will be accounted for this sin. The reference point in the Quran for this is here: Surah Al-Baqarah - 2:278 | Quran.com
How this may apply to your situation would be as follows;
The money you previously made is yours to keep - this was innocently made and by Gods permission you will not be penalised for it and inshallah forgiven. The money you will be attempting to offset (which you now know is haram) is not to be used and no longer belongs to you therefore should be disposed of. So in answer to your direct question, no, you should not use this money to offset fees.
If you do decide to dispose of this money without using it it to be noted that this money should not be used to build mosques.
And Allah knows best.
Assalamu aleykum wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh!
Jazakallahu khayr @AdviceSeeker for taking the time to read and answer. I appreciate it a lot. I understand what you have wrote and I don’t mean to offend you but I would feel more in peace if I can have the answer of one of the muftis @Mufti_Billal @Mufti_Faraz_Adam in shaa Allah.
As a precision I would add that I didn’t decide to put my money in an account that would be invested in haram activities. I had specified ans insisted with the brokers on this point. And I thought the money was invested in the social responsible found and not dealing with any riba. Once I made my own researches and found that it was invested in the wrong place, I started the procedure to withdraw the money and close the account. It took multiple months before completing and meanwhile, the money was still being invested in the haram activities. It has just been finalized. My mistake there was to trust them instead of making my own researches before signing the deal.
So here are the numbers to be clearer:
Total halal money: 1380$
Approximate total amount withdrawn from the account: 1494.67$
Approximate haram money:114,67$
Withdrawal fees: 360$
So my question using the numbers is:
Should I withdraw the 360$ from the 1380$ halal money once I’ve gotten rid of the 114,67$ haram money.
Or should I use the haram money to pay a portion of their fees in which case there would still be 245,33$ of fees to pay from the halal money?
In the first case I lose 360$ and in the second case 245,33$ paying the fees.
For sure I will not like to lose too much money in this bad move that I made. But my priority is to do the correct and halal thing.
So @Mufti_Billal @Mufti_Faraz_Adam, please let me know what I should do.
Barakallahu fikum!
Wasalam
May Allah bless you.
Yes in this particular situation, you can pay the cancellation fee and return the profit made from this investment, to the same institution.
And Allah knows best!
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Jazakallahu Khayr wa barakallahu fik!
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