Issues in Bay' Bithaman Al-Ajil ('BBA'): A scrutiny of some selected BBA terms

It is trite fact that Bay' Bithaman al-Ajil ('BBA') is a type of l'slarnic Home Financing Facility ('IHFF'). BBA is popular among Islamic Banks in Malaysia in providing IHFF facility to house purchasers in the burgeoning housing industry in Malaysia.However, some scholars argue that BBA is an inadequate IHFF as it fails to provide sufficient protection to house purchasers particularly when housing projects are abandoned.Thus, it is argued that BBA is a non shariah compliant product due to the existence of gharar elements.This can render its transaction void under Islamic Law. This paper aims to discuss and demonstrate the terms used by a selected Islamic Bank in Malaysia in their BBA documentations.Further, this paper proposes improvisations of the inadequate terms in the BBA in order to ensure it a well-balanced and equitable facility.This paper is an outcome of a research using legal research methodologies and textual legal analysis of the BBA documents. Through this paper, it finds that BBA's terms used in the selected Islamic Bank are incapable of providing reciprocal benefits to the purchaser victims in abandoned housing projects.This paper proposes that the current terms in BBA should be improved to give justice to purchasers