---
title: "AI apps in the client portal"
description: "How a client's people can connect an AI app such as Claude to the portal, what it can and cannot do for them, and how you turn it off."
url: "https://support.outpostplatform.com/client-portal/ai-apps/"
product: "depot"
type: "concept"
status: "draft"
ai_summary: "Preview. The client portal serves MCP at <portal address>/portal/mcp. A portal user connects an AI app with OAuth for one organization, and it acts with their portal permissions. Payments, sign-in settings, remote sessions, and audit export are never tools. Decisions and changes to people or access need the person's confirmation. Follows the MSP's Settings > AI rules."
availability:
  plans: ["msp"]
  preview: true
source: "https://gitlab.com/outpostplatform/docs/-/edit/main/src/content/docs/client-portal/ai-apps.md"
license: "CC BY 4.0"
---

# AI apps in the client portal

People at your clients can connect an AI app, such as Claude, to the client
portal, and ask it to look up their invoices, open a ticket, or check a
device. The app works as that person, with their portal permissions and
nothing more. This page explains how it works, what it can never do, and how
you control it.

## How it works

The portal serves the Model Context Protocol (MCP) at
`https://<portal-address>/portal/mcp`, where `<portal-address>` is your portal's
address or custom domain.

- **Sign-in.** The app signs in with OAuth. The person signs in to the portal
  in their browser, sees the name the app gave itself, chooses one
  organization, and selects **Connect**. The app never sees their password.
- **One organization.** A connection reaches one organization. To use the app
  with another, the person connects it again.
- **Their permissions.** Each tool is one portal action, and the app can use
  only those the person's roles allow, within your ceiling.
- **A record of every change.** Changes the app makes appear in the client's
  activity log with **via AI assistant** and the app's name.
- **Their control.** The person sees and disconnects their apps under
  **Your account** > **Connected AI apps**. Suspending or offboarding them,
  resetting their password, or locking their account disconnects their apps.
- **A limited lifetime.** A connection lasts up to 90 days. If you set
  **Longest session, hours** below its default of 12, connections made after
  that last no longer than it. See [Portal defaults](/client-portal/defaults/).

## What an app can never do

These are never tools, whatever the person's permissions:

- Paying an invoice, saving or removing a payment method, and turning autopay
  on or off.
- Anything to do with signing in: passwords, second factors, passkeys, and
  sessions.
- Starting a remote session.
- Exporting the activity log.
- Switching organization, or managing connected apps.

## What needs the person's confirmation

Before the app does any of these, the person confirms it on the **Approve an
AI action** page in the portal, which shows the action and its details:

- Accepting or declining a quote or a project milestone.
- Answering an approval request.
- Sending a leaver request.
- Inviting, changing, or removing people, and changing roles and groups.
- Changing remote access grants or the client's remote access rules.

Approving asks the person to confirm who they are again when they have been
idle.

## How you control it

AI apps in the portal follow your rules on **Settings** > **AI**. They cannot
connect when **Allow AI tools to connect** is off under **AI tools (MCP)**,
when your client policy is **Off for all clients**, or when AI access is off
for that client. See [Connect AI tools with MCP](/pioneer-ai/mcp-server/).

Calls are limited per connection and per person to 120 a minute.

## Related

- [Using the client portal: connected AI apps](/portal-guide/connected-ai-apps/)
- [Connect AI tools with MCP](/pioneer-ai/mcp-server/)