Common questions. Straight answers.

In most states, no. Cannabis is still federally scheduled, so the major card networks will not carry plant-touching sales. Shops mostly run cash, debit workarounds, or ACH. We say what is actually available rather than selling you a story.

No. A cashless ATM is not card acceptance. It codes the sale as a cash withdrawal at the register, which misrepresents what happened. Card networks have taken enforcement action on exactly that, and the merchant is the one who loses the account and the money in it.

Cash with proper handling, PIN debit through a compliant program where the sponsor bank allows it, ACH and pay-by-bank, and closed-loop wallets. Each has trade-offs. We walk through them on our dispensary payments page instead of pretending one is a clean card solution.

The 2018 Farm Bill removed hemp from the federal controlled substances definition, provided the product stays at or below 0.3% delta-9 THC on a dry weight basis. State law still varies, and some states restrict specific hemp products outright. Check your state before you build a storefront around it.

Because their published policies ban CBD, and they enforce them by termination rather than by warning. Those companies are aggregators. They put thousands of merchants under one master account, so a category they consider risky gets removed instead of underwritten. It is a policy decision, not a judgment about your business.

It is a merchant account underwritten individually, with a bank that has agreed to accept your category. You get your own merchant ID instead of sharing one. Underwriting is slower and pricing runs higher than an aggregator, but the account is yours and it does not vanish when a policy sweep runs.

Usually yes, through a processor and sponsor bank that board the category deliberately. That is the part most owners are never told after an aggregator shuts them off. Compliant lab reports, accurate product claims and clean marketing all matter to the underwriter.

No, and nobody honestly can. Approval is the sponsor bank underwriting decision, not ours. Anyone in this category who promises you an outcome is either guessing or selling. What we can do is tell you before you apply whether your business looks boardable, and what would need to change if it does not.

Expect business formation documents, a government ID for the owners, several months of bank statements, and processing statements if you have them. For hemp and CBD, expect certificates of analysis, supplier documentation, product labels and a review of your website claims.

Health claims on your site are a common one, since implying a product treats or cures anything draws attention from the FDA and from underwriting. Others include unclear ownership, a heavy chargeback history, missing lab documentation, and selling into a state that restricts your product.

Clean up product claims, publish real refund and shipping policies, make sure your age gate works, and get your lab reports organized and current. Every one of these is checked, and every one is easier to fix before an underwriter finds it.

Yes. Most retailers in this category need both, and the two decisions affect each other. We cover the register, age verification at checkout, inventory and how the processing sits behind it.

It depends on the business, and we will not publish a number that pretends otherwise. Cost is driven by your category, your volume, your average ticket, your chargeback history and your hardware. We put a written quote together for your specific business, and you see the full structure before you commit to anything.

No. Rooted Payments is an independent payments brand. We are not a bank, not a lender, and not the processor of record. We connect merchants with processing and point-of-sale, and the account itself sits with the processor and its sponsor bank.

We tell you, and we tell you early. Sending a hopeless application through underwriting wastes your week and burns a bank relationship. If there is a version of your business that is boardable, we will explain what that looks like.