| Late last year, Visa issued a warning shot to licensed cannabis dispensaries employing “cashless ATM” services at the point of sale. “Visa is aware of a scheme where point-of-sale devices marketed as ‘Cashless ATMs’ are being deployed at merchant outlets and are operating in violation of the Visa core rules,” the statement read. That “scheme” involves dispensary software that codes cannabis purchases as ATM cash disbursements. A customer might buy a $35 pack of gummies, let’s say, and choose to pay with a debit card; the budtender would then round up the purchase to an even $40, clock the transaction as a cash withdrawal and give the $5 in change back to the customer. According to Visa, this runs afoul of the corporation’s electronic fund transfer rules. At the time, Visa hinted vaguely at “compliance enforcement,” but no action was taken. Now, third-party point-of-sale (POS) software providers that dabble in cashless ATM processing are apparently pulling up stakes and shutting down this service in the cannabis space. Bloomberg reported on the sudden switcheroo this week. “Small dispensaries in Arizona, California and Massachusetts have all experienced outages, according to employees who were recommending that customers use cash,” reporter Tiffany Kary wrote, citing NCR Corp.’s Columbus Data Services as one POS provider that has shut down cashless ATM services. “Large dispensary chains of multistate operators were also said to be affected.” Despite the headlines, however, it’s a bit unclear what is actually happening. Are service providers unilaterally deciding to bail on the cash disbursement option? Is Visa actively involved? Are dispensaries merely experiencing a glitch in the software, as Curaleaf chairman Boris Jordan insisted? The tension is heightened when we look to Washington, D.C., where a lame-duck congressional session has the opportunity to pass the SAFE Banking Act (or “SAFE-Plus,” the new colloquialism for an amended package of cannabis banking reform regulation now awaiting the possibility of a U.S. Senate vote). Federal legislation could certainly provide guidance and tee up a regulatory landscape that would simply allow debit card processing—doing away with the uneasy mystery at the point of sale. In the meantime, however, the scramble to respond to financial pressures is real. If you’d like to share how this news will affect your dispensary’s day-to-day operations or month-to-month budgeting for 2023, feel free to get in touch. -Eric Sandy, Digital Editor | 