the ones who financed the underlying mortgages in an RF way. More details
on RF MBSs will be included in the next chapter, which is devoted to RF
financing case studies.
Selling the Servicing of the Finance Facility to Generate a Fee Income After
the financing facility has been booked by any bank, it must be serviced.
This means that the servicing department must issue the monthly billing
statements and mail them to the customers, receive payments, keep track of
the accounting, keep track of the insurance validity on the property and
whether insurance is current, and make sure that the customer is paying lo-
cal, state, and federal taxes on time. In the United States, there are compa-
nies that are willing to ‘‘buy’’ the servicing of the loans and pay a generous
fee to the bank or the finance company. As discussed in Chapter 10, it was
decided not to follow this practice, because we felt that it did not fit with
Shari’aa and Judeo-Christian-Islamic values. It would be unacceptable to
invest in a customer and then sell the relationship so that when the customer
calls, he/she is connected to a representative whom he/she has never met,
who may not be familiar with the community and with RF banking and
finance values.
Screening of the Existing Deposit and Investment Accounts All of the existing
accounts and the owners of these accounts were closely reviewed on a case-
by-case basis and most of them were contacted and/or interviewed. We dis-
covered that the bank had accounts for liquor stores, night clubs, bars, and
check cashing companies. We proceeded to close the accounts of the liquor
stores and the bars, for obvious reasons. We also concluded that the check-
cashing companies were taking advantage of low-income citizens who did
not have a bank account, and that the interest rates charged to these people
were excessive. We decided to close those accounts, as well. It is important
to indicate to the reader that while making the decision to close an account,
we never gave weight to the size of the account. We focused on the require-
ments of the RF moral and ethical values, which manifest the values of
Shari’aa and the Judeo-Christian-Islamic system.
Deciding on Types of Accounts Offered to
Individuals, Families, and Businesses
Most banks in the United States offer a highly diversified array of services
and types of accounts. One day, I asked myself about the motivation behind
the different account types, names, and the conditions that have to be met,
for example, for the customer to obtain a free business account service or
low fees on income-generating accounts. It was clear that these many types
Operating an RF Bank in the United States 347