Out-of-province ID rejected at cannabis store, says P.E.I. woman
Health card doubles as voluntary photo ID in Quebec
A P.E.I. woman says her government-issued photo ID wasn't accepted at the Cannabis P.E.I. store in Charlottetown.
Rebecca Kelly is originally from P.E.I., and moved back to the Island just over a month ago.
She has a health card from Quebec, which acts as a voluntary ID in that province for people who don't have other photo ID.
Kelly says she's used it successfully as ID at P.E.I. liquor stores. She doesn't have a driver's license or a passport.
She says she went to the Charlottetown store Wednesday around 10 a.m., and waited about an hour in line. When she entered, IDs were being scanned by an employee.
She noticed other people were using out-of-province IDs and didn't think hers would be a problem — but it wouldn't scan.
A supervisor was called, she said, and told her her card couldn't be accepted because it is a health card.
"It's their job, so I didn't really make too much of a fuss," she said. "I just think that they should have put that out in the first place if it was going to be a problem with the ID."
An email statement from Zach Currie, the director of cannabis operations in P.E.I., acknowledged Quebec health cards have a photo and birth date, and said Kelly's ID will be accepted if she returns.
"We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and we are hopeful this individual will return to shop with us again," he said.
He said checking IDs is a high priority, and that staff use "a blend of discretion and our sophisticated ID scanners" to figure out what ID is accepted.
"We appreciate our customer's patience with us as we deal with very large crowds with a wide range of IDs. We will continuously review our internal policy framework to ensure we're staying responsive to all forms of identification issued across the world," he said.
Kelly says she plans to get a voluntary ID from P.E.I. soon, but says she's been told that could take about two weeks to be issued.
Kelly wasn't the only person to have ID issues at the store on opening day — the first person in line in Charlottetown wasn't able to buy anything because his ID had expired.