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662 points JacobHenner | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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mannyv ◴[] No.40214223[source]
One major effect of this is that weed stores will be able to use banks and payment processors legally once the regulators catch up.
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andrewxdiamond ◴[] No.40214371[source]
A lot of them have wiggled around this problem by offering “atms” at the cash register. You pay with a debit card, but it’s not a normal transaction, it’s an ATM withdrawal! I don’t understand how the money is vended to the business, but it keeps it out of the store
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bobthepanda ◴[] No.40214788[source]
there is still a lot of cash on site due to the presence of an ATM though, and in the cash registers. the primary problem is that weed shops are incredibly attractive robbery targets due to being one of the few businesses in 2024 that handle large amounts of cash.
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filoleg ◴[] No.40214926[source]
Often enough, it isn’t an actual ATM. You pay at the counter like you usually would using a card or an NFC payment method (e.g., Apple Pay), but the payment reader processes it as an ATM withdrawal transaction (hence an extra transaction fee of a few dollars). There is no physical cash involved at any point in this (at least not on the dispensary premises).
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bobthepanda ◴[] No.40215774[source]
Maybe this is a state by state thing? I have never observed this in WA.
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1. filoleg ◴[] No.40242315[source]
It feels like it is a state-by-state thing, yeah. I moved from WA to NYC just half a year ago, and I noticed it as well.

In WA, it felt like it was a pretty even 50/50 split (maybe with a heavier lean towards cash) between places accepting cash-only and those that accept debit as well (in addition to cash obviously). I dont remember any that accepted credit cards. All of this is a more recent situation though, as I still remember that just 6-8 years ago, pretty much every single place used to be cash-only. I also noticed some dispensaries experimenting with rather unconvential methods at different points in time too (e.g., Uncle Ike’s using a payment terminal for like a year that worked similarly to a regular debit card one, but it was using crypto as an intermediate medium on the backend to process the payment).

In NYC, it feels like everyone just accepts cards like usual, from grey-market ones to the legal ones.

However, I infinitely prefer the WA situation with cannabis over the NYC one for bajillion other reasons that are entirely unrelated to payment methods.