How Pricing Works
We price API integrations per integration. Each one is scoped on its own and quoted in writing before any work starts, because the cost depends on what you are connecting and how the data has to move between the systems. A one-way push of new orders into an accounts package is a small job. A two-way sync between a CRM and a booking system, where both sides can edit the same record, is a much bigger one.
We do not publish a price list for custom work (the pricing overview explains why). What we can tell you up front is what drives the number, what is in it, and what sits outside it.
When you need several integrations, we usually scope them together. They share authentication handling, logging and the queue that runs them, so the second and third cost less than they would on their own.
What Kind Of Integration Are You Pricing?
Most requests fall into one of a few shapes, and the shape does more to set the cost than the platforms involved.
A one-way sync copies data from a source system to a destination on a schedule or when something changes: new Stripe payments into Xero, new form entries into a CRM. One direction means one system is always right, so there are no conflicts to resolve.
A two-way sync keeps a record consistent in two systems that both allow edits. It needs rules for what happens when both sides change the same field, and those rules are where most of the effort goes.
An event-driven workflow reacts to webhooks and runs several steps across several systems: a signed contract creates the client in the CRM, opens a project, raises the first invoice and tells the account manager. Each step is simple. The cost is in handling a failure halfway through without leaving half a client behind.
A legacy or awkward API is anything with poor documentation, unusual authentication, tight rate limits or no sandbox to test against. The same integration costs more against a system like that than against a modern, documented API.
Our Stripe and Xero integration page walks through a one-way sync in detail, if you want to see what the work involves.
What Affects The Price
- API quality. Well-documented REST APIs with webhooks are quicker to build against than older or patchily documented ones.
- Sync direction. One-way is cheaper than two-way, because two-way needs conflict rules.
- Timing. Webhook-driven, near real-time sync takes more work than a scheduled batch every hour or overnight.
- Data transformation. Mapping a field to a field is quick. Splitting, merging, recalculating or cleaning data on the way through is not.
- Authentication. An API key is simple. OAuth with token refresh across several client accounts takes longer.
- Volume and rate limits. Platforms with strict limits need queueing and throttling so a busy day doesn’t get requests rejected.
- What should happen on failure: whether a logged error is enough, or you need automatic retries, a holding queue for records that can’t be processed, and an alert to a named person.
Before asking for a quote, it helps to work through how to plan an API integration. The answers to its questions are most of what we need to scope one.
What Is Included
- Assessment of each API: what it can do, its limits, how it authenticates
- The integration design: data flow, sync strategy and error handling, agreed before development
- Development, including authentication, rate limiting and retry logic
- Data mapping between the systems so records match on both sides
- Logging, retries and alerts, so a failure is noticed before a customer notices it
- End-to-end testing against real API connections, including the edge cases
- Monitoring and health checks once it is live
- Documentation of the architecture, the data flow and how to operate it
- Project tracking through the Client Dashboard
Third-Party API Charges
Some platforms charge for API access, either by plan or per call. Those charges are billed to you by the platform, not by us, and they are not in our estimate. We flag them during scoping so they are not a surprise, and where a platform’s pricing would make an approach expensive at your volume, we say so and suggest another way.
Also outside the estimate:
- Creating accounts and API credentials on third-party platforms
- Cleaning up existing data before the integration runs, which is scoped separately if needed
- Ongoing maintenance after launch, available through a support retainer
Custom Integration Or An Automation Subscription?
A custom integration costs more up front than a Zapier or Make subscription. The subscription costs more as you grow, because those tools charge per task. If your connection is simple, low-volume and not critical, a subscription is usually the cheaper answer and we will tell you that. Our Zapier vs custom integration comparison sets out where the line usually falls.
Get An Estimate
Tell us which platforms you need to connect, what data should move between them and what should happen when something changes. We will read both APIs, scope the integration and send a written estimate. For the wider picture of what we build, see our API integration services, or start with what an API integration is if the term is new. Get in touch to start.
