The employee taking a commission from his company for selling medical devices to patients
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
He says: I work in a field where I advertise for certain medical products that some patients need. I advertise them to doctors in hospitals, and in return, my company pays the hospital a commission percentage on every device the patient buys. Sometimes I am rewarded, and it is a separate commission. How do you guide me? May Allah reward you with good.
The Shaykh:
If you take this commission in exchange for your work and what you do for the company or the buyer, there is nothing wrong with it, because this is of the same kind as what a broker takes in buying and selling. Yes.
The presenter:
If he works as a broker alongside Shaykh Salih’s job, if he works as a broker alongside his job, let us suppose he is an employee at the hospital, and at the same time works as a broker for one of the companies,
The Shaykh:
If the system permits him to work as an employee and to work another job, which is brokering for some companies, there is nothing wrong with it. But if the system he follows prohibits this, it is not permissible for him. Yes.
The presenter:
How many cases are there in which the patient is exploited?
The Shaykh:
What do you mean?
The presenter:
I mean that the patient is exposed to having his money taken from him in many circumstances.
The Shaykh:
It is not permissible to exploit the patient’s condition to take his money through advertisements, types of treatment, and increasing their prices and costs. This is because the patient tries to pay what he can in exchange for treatment, out of concern for recovery. So his condition is one of dire necessity, and it is not permissible to exploit the situations of dire necessity in which Muslims find themselves for material gain. Rather, the obligatory thing is justice and fairness. Patients are in need of assistance, in need of gentleness with them, and in need of having their expenses lightened, not that they be burdened with financial loads, their money be plundered, and their necessity be exploited in that. Yes.
He says: I work in a field where I advertise for certain medical products that some patients need. I advertise them to doctors in hospitals, and in return, my company pays the hospital a commission percentage on every device the patient buys. Sometimes I am rewarded, and it is a separate commission. How do you guide me? May Allah reward you with good.
The Shaykh:
If you take this commission in exchange for your work and what you do for the company or the buyer, there is nothing wrong with it, because this is of the same kind as what a broker takes in buying and selling. Yes.
The presenter:
If he works as a broker alongside Shaykh Salih’s job, if he works as a broker alongside his job, let us suppose he is an employee at the hospital, and at the same time works as a broker for one of the companies,
The Shaykh:
If the system permits him to work as an employee and to work another job, which is brokering for some companies, there is nothing wrong with it. But if the system he follows prohibits this, it is not permissible for him. Yes.
The presenter:
How many cases are there in which the patient is exploited?
The Shaykh:
What do you mean?
The presenter:
I mean that the patient is exposed to having his money taken from him in many circumstances.
The Shaykh:
It is not permissible to exploit the patient’s condition to take his money through advertisements, types of treatment, and increasing their prices and costs. This is because the patient tries to pay what he can in exchange for treatment, out of concern for recovery. So his condition is one of dire necessity, and it is not permissible to exploit the situations of dire necessity in which Muslims find themselves for material gain. Rather, the obligatory thing is justice and fairness. Patients are in need of assistance, in need of gentleness with them, and in need of having their expenses lightened, not that they be burdened with financial loads, their money be plundered, and their necessity be exploited in that. Yes.
Source
قناة «العلامة الدكتور صالح الفوزان»، 4107- أخذ الموظف عمولة من شركته على بيع الأجهزة الطبية للمرضى - الشيخ صالح الفوزان — youtube.com
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.