Metrc (Marijuana Enforcement Tracking Reporting Compliance) is a state-mandated software platform developed by Franwell for tracking the production, manufacturing, testing, distributing, and selling of cannabis products from seed to sale.
Every state that utilizes Metrc's tracking system has specific regulatory requirements for reporting inventory and sales data. As a medical marijuana or adult-use dispensary license holder in the cannabis industry, it is the responsibility of the business to meet these regulatory reporting requirements with 100% accuracy.
Mistakes or inconsistencies in your Metrc account raise red flags for state regulators and enforcement officials. This puts your business at risk of a state-conducted audit, fines, or being shut down altogether.
This post covers how to report to Metrc, what to do if Metrc goes down, and best practices for Metrc compliance with Flowhub.
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How do I report to Metrc?
Many states are mandated to report sales as they happen in real time, such as Maryland and Oklahoma. If this is a cannabis compliance requirement in your market, Flowhub has built-in, live-sync functionality that automatically reports each sale to Metrc after the transaction is complete.
If you are not required to report sales from your point of sale to Metrc in real-time, you have options:
1. Report to Metrc manually
With this method, data is exported from the point of sale via a CSV file, configured to the correct formatting, and then uploaded manually to the Metrc system.
Benefit: This gives you control over when and how your compliance info is uploaded to the state.
Cost: Manual reporting is the most time and labor intensive method and is most susceptible to human error, which puts you at risk.
2. Report to Metrc automatically after each sales transaction
Automatic reporting, also called “live reporting” means data is pushed to Metrc via an automatic API after each transaction is completed.
Live sales reporting is a compliance requirement in many states.
Benefit: Live reporting eliminates the need to report to Metrc at the end of the day, which saves your employees time and means you won't have to remember to report to Metrc.
Cost: Automated API pushes to Metrc mean all your data is pushed immediately and when there are errors or mistakes, you will have to manually update them in Metrc.
3. Report to Metrc via controlled API push
Reporting to Metrc via a controlled API push from your point of sale or “end-of-day reporting" (EOD) means sending your sales data to Metrc when you want, whether that's multiple times throughout the day or all at once at the very end of the day.
Benefit: Controlled pushes give you the ease and convenience of an automatic API integration with the added safeguard of being able to double-check data before reporting to regulators.
Cost: This method adds another step at the end of the day and has compliance repercussions if forgotten.
Flowhub gives you the ability to push sales to Metrc only when you're ready. If record-keeping errors occur throughout the day, you will have the chance to identify and reconcile them before sending your closing report.
What if Metrc goes down?
Sometimes Metrc’s API connection is disrupted, slow, or goes down altogether. Getting data from Metrc can take time depending on how many packages need to be imported and the response times from Metrc.
Even in this situation, it is still the responsibility of the retailer to report to the state each day.
Flowhub is designed so you can compliantly record sales and import inventory even when Metrc is down. Once Metrc is back up, even if you’re in a live reporting state, you can bulk push sales data to Metrc.
Note: Flowhub will never push duplicate sales, you can push sales as many times as you want and still only send over unpushed sales to Metrc.
Best practices for Metrc compliance
Because Metrc cannabis track-and-trace system is the digital paper trail your license depends on, it is best to choose a point-of-sale technology partner that gives you the tools to manage and audit your Metrc account with complete transparency and control.
Flowhub was built from the ground up to manage compliance and was the first metrc integrator.
⚠️ Be wary of any cannabis point of sale options that claim to manage every aspect of your Metrc account or take the control out of your hands as a licensee. You’ll risk maintaining compliance.
When reporting to Metrc, we recommend following these best practices to save time and ensure compliance:
Splitting packages in Metrc
Although all inventory has to be accurately tracked within Metrc, the processes and procedures for how that inventory is managed are up to the cannabis business and license holder.
For example, when a large shipment of edibles with several flavors come into a dispensary under one Metrc tag, the dispensary has the option to keep that inventory under that same tag or split it into multiple Metrc tags for each flavor.
⚠️ Be cautious of any point-of-sale providers that make assumptions about your inventory management processes by automatically splitting packages in your Metrc account. At the end of the day you want to be in total control of your compliance data, so avoid any API integration that goes so far as to remove your ability to control how you manage and report your Metrc inventory.
We recommend that if you need to split a package, do so in Metrc first and only import into Flowhub once your packages are in the configuration you’ll sell from.
Importing packages from Metrc
Once clear procedures are established around your inventory management, Flowhub makes it easy to import and track Metrc package tags. The in-app Metrc Discrepancy Management feature shows exactly which package tags are active at your facility and not yet imported as inventory in Flowhub. From here, you can easily convert the Metrc package to inventory, guaranteeing accurate Metrc data and smooth sales reporting.
Suppliers are sometimes inconsistent in their naming conventions with each new shipment of products that come into a store from a Metrc Manifest. Flowhub solves this with a global product catalog where you can have consistent naming conventions across all locations.
Then, Flowhub’s Import Packages feature automatically maps the sometimes inconsistent data from the supplier Metrc manifest to the clean and consistent data within the global Flowhub Product Catalog. This feature not only keeps your inventory data clean and organized but also allows for better reporting and forecasting with that inventory data long-term.
Standardize your Units of Measure
In Metrc, you’ll have the option to use various Units of Measure (UOM), such as grams or ounces. All growers may not use the same types of UOM so as a best practice, everything in Metrc that’s weight-based should be in grams.
Flowhub is made to work with grams for all weight-based UOMs so you can use one standard measurement across the board. This will eliminate the need for additional calculations to convert between units of measure.
Auditing your Metrc account
You will regularly need to audit your Metrc account to resolve discrepancies between your physical inventory, your POS inventory, and your Metrc inventory. Depending on the POS system you use, this can be time consuming or very simple.
Being able to compare our Flowhub inventory to our Metrc inventory is critical, and Flowhub's reporting system allows us to do just that!
—Niko Johnson, Store Manager at Diego Pellicer
There are five common Metrc discrepancies for dispensaries:
‘Quantity Discrepancy’
‘Active Package Not in Flowhub’
‘Not Found in Metrc’
‘Unit of Measure’
‘Multiple Skus’
Flowhub’s in-app Metrc Discrepancy Management workflow enables dispensaries to resolve these discrepancies directly within the cannabis point of sale with full transparency and control over your data in both systems. Plus, Unit of Measure discrepancies are auto-resolved, while Multiple Skus is no longer an issue.
The new workflow enables retailers to:
Quickly fix quantity discrepancies: Easily identify and resolve Flowhub and Metrc inventory differences on a package-by-package basis.
Adjust packages in Metrc from Flowhub: Directly adjust the quantity of packages in Metrc with valid Metrc Reasons and Notes attached.
Import Metrc packages not yet in Flowhub: Clicking "Fix Flowhub" on packages not yet imported will automatically take you to the workflow to add inventory with pre-populated Metrc data.
Identify packages not active in Metrc: Rapidly identify package IDs that are not active in Metrc due to type entry error, or the package no longer being active at your facility.
Maui makes Metrc easy
Metrc can complicate inventory and data management. Keeping your data accurate between the physical, POS, and Metrc worlds takes significant time and careful workflows.
This is why we created Flowhub Maui, the most efficient cannabis inventory management solution available. Maui streamlines Metrc discrepancy management, simplifies package management, and empowers retailers to own and control their own data at all times.
To learn how Flowhub Maui can save your business countless hours and thousands of dollars, schedule a demo today!
