Connecting Chili Piper via MCP

Connect your Chili Piper account to AI coding tools using the Model Context Protocol (MCP). Once connected, your AI assistant can read and manage your Chili Piper data – users, meetings, routing rules, distributions, and more – directly from the terminal.

Table of Contents

• Prerequisites
• Get your API key
• Configure Claude Code
• Verify the connection
• Available tools
• Security best practices
• Good to Know

Supported Clients

Any tool that supports .mcp.json configuration with remote HTTP servers should work. The setup instructions below use Claude Code as the example.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure you have:

1. Claude Code is installed on your machine. Claude Code is a terminal application from Anthropic – see Anthropic's documentation for installation instructions.
2. A Chili Piper API key with the appropriate permissions for what you want to use the Chili Piper MCP for.
3. Your tenant must be enabled for MCP access by Chili Piper – contact your Customer Success Manager to opt in.

Get your API key

1. In Admin Center, go to Integrations in the left sidebar.
2. Select the Credentials tab at the top of the page.
3. Make sure you are on the API Access Tokens sub-tab (not HTTP Auth);
4. Click Generate Token.
5. Select the permissions (scopes) your token needs, then click Generate.
6. Copy the token and store it securely. You will need it in the next step. The token is only shown once.

Configure Claude Code

There are two ways to add the Chili Piper MCP server to Claude Code. Choose the option that fits your setup.

Option A: Personal project config (single user)

This stores the configuration in a .mcp.json file in your project directory. Add this file to .gitignore so your API key is not committed to version control.

1. Create a file called .mcp.json in the root of your project directory:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "chili-piper": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://fire.chilipiper.com/api/fire-edge/v1/org/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"
      }
    }
  }
}

2. Replace YOUR_API_KEY with your actual API key;
3. Add .mcp.json to your .gitignore file:

# .gitignore
.mcp.json

4. Save both files and restart Claude Code.

Option B: Shared project config (team setup)

This stores the server URL in a project file that can be committed to git, while each team member keeps their own API key in an environment variable.

1. Create a file called .mcp.json in the root of your project:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "chili-piper": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://fire.chilipiper.com/api/fire-edge/v1/org/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer ${CHILI_PIPER_API_KEY}"
      }
    }
  }
}

2. Each team member adds the following line to their shell profile (~/.zshrc on macOS, ~/.bashrc on Linux):

export CHILI_PIPER_API_KEY="your-api-key-here"

3. Restart the terminal, then restart Claude Code.

Verify the Connection

1. Open Claude Code in your terminal.
2. Type /mcp – the chili-piper server should appear in the list as connected.
3. Ask Claude: "What Chili Piper tenant is connected?" – Claude should return your organization name (e.g., "Acme Corp").

If the server does not appear or returns an error, double-check:

• Your API key is correct and has not been revoked;
• Your tenant is enabled by Chili Piper for MCP access.
• The Authorization header includes the word Bearer followed by a space before the key;
• You restarted Claude Code after saving the config file.

Available Tools

Once connected, Claude Code has access to the following Chili Piper tools. You do not need to call these directly – Claude uses them automatically based on your questions.

Organization

Users

Workspaces

Teams

Distributions

Routing Rules

Meetings

Scheduling

Handoff

Concierge

CRM

Example: Checking your Tenant

Example: Listing Users

Security Best Practices

• Do not commit API keys to git. Use environment variables (Option B) or add .mcp.json to your .gitignore (Option A);
• Revoke any keys that are no longer in use or that are suspected of being compromised;
• Each team member should use their own API key – do not share a single key across the team.

Good to Know

• Early access – your tenant must be enabled by your Customer Success Manager before connecting;
• All tool calls are scoped to your organization (tenant);
• The tools include write operations – review confirmations carefully;
• Distribution weight adjustments are additive, not absolute.