API Integration Guide

To request a partnership complete our form: Become a Partner

Our Partnerships team will review your application and will reach out to learn more. We do our best to respond to every request but our response time will depend on the number of partnership requests currently in our queue. Requests are responded to in the order they are received.

After we have a chance to review your application and understand the opportunity for a mutually beneficial partnership, we will share our Connectivity Agreement for signature. This agreement has been standardized across all partners and outlines the basic requirements/expectations of our API partners. In order to protect both parties, partnership opportunities may also require our mutual NDA to be signed.

Once agreements have been signed, we'll proceed with API Onboarding steps. 

Once ready to start development and/or testing on your end, we'll create a partner account that will include API credentials and a test account with dummy data. 

Note: Before initiating a partnership discussion and review you can request a partner test account to integrations@cloudbeds.com that will allow you to test the integration prior to the Partnership Review (section 1).

Please see the Certification Call section below that covers the points that will be verified during certification.

During the Development phase you will have access to:

• Cloudbeds partner & test account. Before certification, your app can only connect to your test account.
• Partner-level API credentials
• Developer support via email
  • Support is provided through email. Response time is 1-2 business days
  • Phone and live chat are currently not offered for dev support

Make sure you're subscribed to our Newsletter and follow our Changelog! We'll keep you up to date with the changes on our API.

Once the integration from your side is completed, there will be a short certification call to run through some simple scenarios and verify everything works as expected.

The following must be submitted before a certification call can be scheduled:

• URL of your app’s Knowledge base article.
• App content submitted in your partner account on the App Details page.

The following 3 mandatory points will be verified during the certification call, in case you decide to implement optional points 4 and 5, those will also be covered:

1. OAuth 2.0 - We'll be checking how you implemented automated OAuth flow. Your redirect URI must be HTTPS and on your production environment. You'll be connecting your app account to a new Cloudbeds account. We'll provide the credentials on the call.
2. User Authorization Flow Options   You will be showing the end-user (property owner) flow to see all of the functionality of the integration.
   1.  We'll be covering mandatory requirements corresponding to your app category
   2. If an active data pull is involved, make sure your system has a method to run this during the call.
   3. All of the API calls you're using, both mandatory and optional must be showcased.
3. Connecting & Disconnecting Apps - Your app integration should correctly handle having an API session/connection canceled by a user inside of Cloudbeds. You'll have to disconnect the app and reconnect again.
4. Account Creation (Optional)- If using the Cloudbeds API to create a new account in your software, make sure that you can validate the data pulled during the call.
5. Supporting Group Accounts (Optional)- If your app supports group users we'll verify if app is able to correctly parse data from multiple property accounts Eg: Property select menu, UI designation for property involved, etc

Certification outcomes

• If your app passes certification, you can begin the pilot testing.
• If your app does not pass certification, we’ll provide concrete feedback on what needs to be fixed. After those fixes are implemented, another certification call can be scheduled.

In this stage, your app is only available for a select number of pilot properties. This process is typically about two-weeks, but can vary depending on whether any additional fixes are needed. We allow up to 5 pilot test properties.

Pilot testing outcomes

• If no issues are encountered, then your app leaves the closed beta pilot and is available for all users as an open beta.
• If mild issues encountered, they can be fixed without returning to test account. Example: Unexpected formatting, excessively high polling intervals.
• If severe issues encountered, partner is provided with concrete feedback on what to fix and returned to their test environment. Once the issues are fixed, a new call can be scheduled to re-certify the app. Example: Data corruption, broken API calls/OAuth paths.

A brief period (typically 2-4 weeks) to check for any remaining issues and collect feedback from your users about any UI or integration improvements. Any number of accounts may be connected.

Beta testing outcomes

• If a significant integration-breaking bug is found, your app might be returned to pilot-testing or pending certification.
• If no issues occurred we'll remove "beta" flags and labels from your app.

Congratulations! Your app has officially launched for all Cloudbeds users. Property owners across the world are now able to utilize your technology to improve their daily lives.

Maintenance

In case you'd like to develop new integration features or do any kind of maintenance work, let us know and we'll provide you with a separate set of test API credentials. Any major change will require a certification call and Knowledge base article updates.

Support expectations and process

• You are expected to solve any urgent issues reported by end user or Cloudbeds support the same working day (day after or Monday if holiday or weekend).
• You are expected to provide responses to onboarding and customer service questions (concerning integration) within 24 hours.
• In case of issues for which you need developer support from Cloudbeds please send your request to devhelp@cloudbeds.com and we will respond within 24 hours (day after or Monday if holiday or weekend). Provide us with as many details as possible (e.g. X-request-ID, methods, results, error messages) this will speed up our investigation.
• A while back, we added the key X-Request-ID in the HTTP Response Header. We highly encourage you to include this ID anytime you submit a customer service request so we can provide you with quicker and more accurate support.

Once the integration is live and certified, in some scenarios a re-certification will be required, specifically when you require new write permission scopes. If you’re planning to add new features please get in touch with us at integrations@cloudbeds.com and we'll help schedule everything.

• At this point, we can offer up to 2 additional sets of API credentials for your various environments (test, dev, staging). Send us the redirect URI for each new API Credentials set that you want linked to your partner dev account.
• Please specify the functionality that you’re planning to implement, corresponding methods, and its permission scopes.
• During development you’ll have access to change permission scopes for your additional API credentials, you’ll find those within your App Details Page. Please review Uses Cases and let us know if any questions.
• Once you’re ready to re-certify we’ll arrange a call so you’ll be able to demo the new functionality on your production environment linked to your Dev, Test or Staging API credentials. During the call, we will provide you with a test account to be used where you can show us how the new features integrate with Cloudbeds.
• After the re-certification call is passed, we’ll enable permission scopes within your production API Credentials and update relevant documentation as required.
• Please update the integration functionality within your support article when new features have been added and provide us with updated Marketing Content if you need our integrations page to be updated https://www.cloudbeds.com/integrations/ (e.g. branding changes)
• Occasionally, if you require new permission scopes to read data, a re-certification call will not be needed, please contact us to confirm or for any other questions.