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Partner API & MCP

Updated by Haydn

Partner API & MCP

The Partner API lets your partners connect their own tools to the data they see in your partner portal — and MCP lets them do the same with AI assistants like Claude, ChatGPT, and Cursor. A connected tool or assistant can work with the partner's leads and deals in exactly the same way the portal does: it sees only what that partner can see, and follows all of your portal's visibility and sharing rules.

This is a partner-facing feature. Your own team's API access is separate — see API Keys for that.

Turning it on

Go to Settings, then Modules & AI, and turn on the Partner Portal API & MCP switch. Only admins can do this.

  • The switch only appears when the company-wide API & MCP feature is turned on for your account. That one is managed by Journeybee — if you do not see the switch, contact your account manager or support.

  • You can turn the Partner Portal API & MCP off again at any time. Partners' keys and connections stop working straight away, and their API & MCP page disappears from the portal.

What partners see

When the feature is on, partners get an API & MCP item at the bottom of their portal menu, just above Settings. It opens a page called Connect with MCP or API with:

  • Buttons to the Partner API docs and Partner MCP docs — the technical guides for whoever sets up the connection.

  • The MCP server URL they use to connect an AI assistant, with a copy button.

  • A list of their partner API keys, with a Create key button.

Connecting an AI assistant (no key needed)

For AI assistants like Claude, ChatGPT, or Cursor, partners do not need an API key at all:

  1. In the AI assistant, add a remote MCP server (sometimes called a custom connector) using the MCP server URL from the API & MCP page.

  2. The assistant opens your partner portal sign-in page. The partner logs in as usual.

  3. They review and approve access on the consent screen. Access is granted for the partnership they currently have open in the portal.

  4. Done — the assistant is connected. Access can be removed at any time by deleting the connector in the assistant.

Once connected, an assistant can look up the partner's partnerships, view and register leads, and view, create, and update deals — including moving them between pipeline stages where the partnership's settings allow it. On a co-selling deal this also covers deals the partner supports: a supporting partner's tool or assistant sees the deal and can update it, but never its lead or its money, and the partner contacts returned for it cover every partner on the deal. Deal responses list every partner on the deal — the primary partner first — with each partner's role where one is set, and a partner can see a deal's primary partner role but cannot change it. Nothing can ever be deleted through the Partner API or MCP. If you require a pricing calculator quote on leads or deals, that applies here too: a lead or deal can carry a quote from an accessible calculator, and one without a quote is refused. The same goes for lead status forms: where your company requires an accept or reject form, a tool moving a lead to that status must include the shared answers — and the reason when partners see it — in the same update, or the change is refused. Fields that are not shared, and a reason you keep hidden, are never visible to partner tools.

Partner API keys

For custom integrations and tools that cannot sign in through a browser, partners create a key instead:

  1. On the API & MCP page, click Create key.

  2. Give it a Label (optional) and choose Read access and/or Write access. Read is on by default; write is off.

  3. Click Create. The full key is shown once, with the warning: “Store this key in a safe place. You won't be able to see it again.”

Good to know about keys:

  • Partner keys start with jb_partner_, so they are easy to tell apart from your company's own keys (which start with jb_live_).

  • A key belongs to the partnership the partner had open when they created it. Partners who work with you through more than one partnership keep a separate set of keys for each, and the list on the API & MCP page only shows the keys for the partnership they are currently viewing.

  • Each partner user can have up to 10 active keys with your company, counted across all of their partnerships with you. If they need more, they should revoke ones they no longer use.

  • Revoking a key (the bin button, then Revoke key) stops it working immediately and cannot be undone.

  • A read-only key can never change anything — tools connected with it will not even see the actions that create or update records.

Good to know

  • Everything a partner's tools and assistants can see or change follows the same rules as the portal itself — room access, partnership settings, sharing settings, and visibility limits all apply.

  • If a partner's tool reports the error “Partner API access is not enabled for this company”, the Partner Portal API & MCP switch is off on your Modules & AI page.

  • If a partner's tool reports the error “Partner API key is no longer bound to a partnership”, the key was created before keys were tied to a partnership and could not be matched to one automatically. The partner should create a new key from the API & MCP page and update their tool. If an AI assistant reports that its connection is no longer bound to a partnership, they should remove the connector and connect it again.

  • If a partner's tool is refused when creating a lead or deal with the reason quote_required, a calculator they can access is marked Required on leads or Required on deals and the request carried no quote. The reason calculator_not_available means the request named a calculator the partner cannot use for that type of record. Both lead and deal creation accept a quote object; the developer guides show the shape. See Quotes on Leads and Deals.

  • The Partner API and Partner MCP developer guides cover the technical details — endpoints, regions, and connection examples — and are the right thing to send to a partner's developer.

  • If a partner's tool is refused when creating or updating a deal with the reason hidden_by_rule, the Deal name standard field is hidden in your field settings — the deal is named automatically from the lead's company or contact instead.

  • If a partner's tool is refused when changing a lead's status or a deal's stage, or when registering a deal in a stage other than the first in the pipeline, with the reason locked_by_partnership, their partnership has Allow partners to edit lead status or Allow partners to edit deal stages turned off — see Partner Management. The request is refused completely, so nothing in it is saved; sending the existing value is allowed.

  • Changes a partner's tools and assistants make appear in your History tab on the record, labelled with the key's label or the connected tool's name — a write through a key labelled “Deals sync” reads Partner key “Deals sync” — so you can tell a connected tool's changes apart from what the partner did in the portal itself.