All eight of Hawaii’s medical cannabis dispensaries will go cashless as of Oct 1., opting instead to use the CanPay system, according to a KOHN2 report. In addition to allowing the dispensaries to forgo cash transactions, the debit payment mobile application system will allow them to direct deposit employee payroll, collect and remit taxes, and make vendor payments.
Gov. David Ige, said the system will allow the state to focus on product and public safety and “makes dispensary transactions transparent.”
“These dispensaries accumulate a lot of cash, which creates challenges for state employees who have to interact with dispensaries as well as with the general public,” Ige said in the report. We’ve been looking for innovative solutions to this challenge.”
The system will be provided by Colorado-based Safe Harbor Private Banking, and Maui Grown Therapeutics and Aloha Green, the two dispensaries currently operating in the state, have already set up accounts with the credit union. The other six companies approved to dispense medical cannabis products are still at varying stages of the approval process and development.
Customers and business owners will download the app to a smartphone, which links up to a checking account, and receive a QR code, which masks the account number of the patient, said state Financial Commissioner Iris Ikeda.
“This QR code is pretty safe,” Ikeda told KOHN. “There’s no personal, non-public information going through this QR code. It will expire after 30 minutes, so you want to be sure that if you want to use this, you get to the medical cannabis dispensary in time.”
Financial services for the cannabis industry are not available in Hawaii because of cannabis’ Schedule I designation under the federal Controlled Substances Act.