Payment dispenser

"It's only half. Please, I have a family."
"One more word, I take it all."

―Padu Cherd pleads with Groff Ditcher after receiving his pay from the payment dispenser^[1]

A payment dispenser^[3] was a flat, gray, square device that could be bolted on to the top of a GNK-series power droid. The device had a series of red, yellow, and white lights on the forward face and various wires on top. On either side of the top surface at the front of the device there was a punch disc slot. When a punch disc was inserted halfway into the slot, credits would be dispensed from the underside of the dispenser.^[1]

In 9 BBY,^[4] a power droid at^[1] Tibidon Station,^[1]^[2] on the planet Tatooine was equipped with a pay dispenser which the station's workers collected their wages from at the end of each shift when a whistle attached to the top of the dispenser sounded. When the worker Padu Cherd inserted his disc after one shift he discovered that he had only received half his pay, but when he begged for the rest from foreman Groff Ditcher he was threatened into silence. Cherd's fellow worker Obi-Wan Kenobi scowled at Ditcher, but ultimately accepted his pay from the dispenser without saying anything.^[1]

Behind the scenes

A payment dispenser appeared in the first episode of the Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi television series,^[1] which aired on May 27, 2022.^[5] The device's name was only spoken in the audio description of the episode.^[3]