“Cash, Card, Or Kidney”: Everything you need to know about Cashless ATMs
Cashless ATMs have been the industry’s dirty little workaround for handling card transactions. A middle finger to the banking system that refused to treat operators like legitimate businesses.
Here is how it typically works. You walk into a shop. You pick out what you want. At checkout they run your debit card, but the POS isn’t really running a card transaction. It is posing as if you walked up to a generic ATM and “withdrew” cash. You get charged in $5 or $10 increments. The budtender hands you your product and maybe a couple dollars in change. The processor shuffles the money through some middle-man bank. Everyone pretends it’s normal.
What a Cashless ATM Really Is
A cashless ATM is not a credit card machine, and it’s not some fancy new payment innovation. It’s a workaround. When a customer inserts their debit card, the system processes the transaction as if they just withdrew cash from an ATM, even though no physical ATM is involved. The amount is rounded up to the nearest five or ten dollars, the transaction clears as a cash withdrawal, and the customer either receives change or the difference is applied to the purchase.
From the customer’s perspective, it feels familiar. You’ve used an ATM before. You’ve pulled forty when you needed thirty, or sixty when you needed fifty. This is the same muscle memory, just happening at the register instead of against a wall. The reason there’s usually a fee is the same reason there’s a fee at a corner-store ATM: the processor, the bank, and the network all take a cut for moving money that traditional banks still don’t want to touch directly. That fee isn’t a penalty—it’s the toll for using a bridge that technically wasn’t built for this road.
Why Customers See the Fee
The fee exists because these transactions are routed through ATM networks, not traditional retail card rails. The networks treat the purchase like cash being dispensed, not goods being sold. That routing comes with built-in costs, and unlike a big-box retailer that can absorb card fees at scale, most stores operate on thin margins and volatile compliance risk.
What matters is transparency. Customers tend to accept the fee when it’s explained plainly: this is how debit works here today, this is why it costs a few dollars, and this is still safer and easier than carrying a pocket full of cash. But lets be real, no one likes feeling taxed.
How Retailers Get Set Up
For retailers, setting up a cashless ATM solution usually starts with a third-party processor that specializes in high-risk or restricted industries. These providers supply a dedicated debit terminal—sometimes handheld, sometimes countertop—that is separate from traditional credit card equipment. The terminal connects to the processor’s network, not your existing card provider, which is why integration with point-of-sale systems like Dutchie, BioTrack or Blaze varies widely.
Some solutions integrate cleanly and pass transaction data directly into the POS. Others require manual tender selection, meaning staff must correctly mark the sale as debit or cashless ATM during checkout. This is where training matters. Without clear SOPs, reconciliation becomes painful, and a busy night can turn into a mess of mismatched cash and card totals.
How Retailers Can Make Money Back
While cashless ATMs are often framed as a cost, they can also be a revenue tool when structured correctly. Many operators share in the transaction fee, much like owning a physical ATM on the floor. Each debit pull generates a small return, and over high daily volume, those dollars add up. Just like a standalone ATM, customers often withdraw more than the exact purchase amount, which increases average basket size and keeps cash circulating inside the store.
The key is volume and consistency. Retailers who already see a near 50/50 split between cash and card-style payments tend to benefit the most. Those volumes justify the fees, offset the revenue share, and reduce the risks associated with storing and handling large amounts of cash.
The Bigger Picture
Cashless ATMs exist because the system is still broken. Even with federal rescheduling moving flower from Schedule I to Schedule III, payment networks have not flipped the switch to allow standard debit and credit processing. Until that happens, operators are left choosing between cash-heavy operations, physical ATMs, or digital versions of the same workaround.
Cashless ATMs are not perfect. They require explanation, discipline, and reconciliation. But they are familiar, functional, and—for now—one of the least bad options in a business that’s spent its entire life operating between the lines.
