Booking leave is a small job that somehow takes a dozen steps. Open the leave tool, find the date picker, work out whether the Friday you want is a bank holiday, check your balance, check whether anyone else on the team is already off, then submit and wait. None of it is hard. It's just a lot of tabs for "I'd like next Friday off."
If you already have Claude or ChatGPT open most of the day, there's a shorter version: say it in a sentence. That's what Recharge's MCP connection does, and this post covers what it actually does, what it deliberately doesn't, and how to try it.
get_leave_balance14 days remainingcheck_leave_request2 teammates off that day
What MCP is, in one paragraph
MCP (Model Context Protocol) is an open standard that lets an AI assistant call tools in another app on your behalf. Connect Recharge once, sign in with your normal Recharge login, and the assistant can look up your balance or submit a request the same way you would in the dashboard, using your account and only your permissions. There's no shared API key and no separate "AI account".
What you can say
The assistant works out which tool to call, so you don't need special syntax. A few prompts that work:
Checking and planning
- “How many days do I have left this year?”
- “Do I have any TOIL banked?”
- “Suggest some good dates for a long weekend.”
- “Is there a clash if I'm off the week of the 12th?”
Doing
- “Book next Tuesday off for a hospital appointment.”
- “Move my leave in March back a week.”
- “Cancel my request for the 24th.”
- “Approve Sam's request and deny the other one, we're short that week.” (managers)
Under the hood that's 27 tools, and most of them can't change anything:
27 tools
21read-only · 78%
Balances, upcoming leave, public holidays, team calendar and coverage checks.
6write · 22%
Create, edit, cancel, approve, deny, and inviting a teammate. Each one is audit-logged.
Everything is scoped to your own organisation, and anything that touches someone else's leave needs manager access.
Why it's more than a chat gimmick
The useful part isn't typing instead of clicking. It's that the assistant can combine steps you'd normally do by hand.
It checks before it books
A request can be checked against your balance, blackout periods and teammates' leave first, so “book Friday off” can come back with “two people on your team are already off that day, still want it?”
It plans, not just records
Ask for the best windows to use up your remaining allowance and it works from your actual balance and the public holidays, instead of you doing the sums.
Managers get a queue they can talk to
“What's waiting on me?” lists pending requests; approving or denying one is a follow-up sentence. Managers still can't approve their own requests, in chat or anywhere else.
The assistant doesn't get its own access. It gets yours, and nothing more.
What it won't do
Worth being plain about the limits, because “AI that books your holiday” sounds like it might also book flights.
Workplace leave only
Recharge has no access to flights, hotels or travel. “Book a holiday” means submit leave.
No self-approval
If you're a manager, another manager has to approve your request.
No role-guessing
Your role is read from your Recharge organisation membership on every call, not taken from what the client claims.
Not silent
Every write, whether made from chat or the dashboard, goes into the same audit log, with who did it and when. Admins can review it under Settings → Audit Log.
The full detail, including scopes and per-tool permissions, is on the MCP security page.
Trying it
- 1
Add the connector
In ChatGPT: Settings → Apps → create an app and use your Recharge address followed by /mcp as the server URL. Claude and other MCP clients that support remote servers take the same URL.
- 2
Sign in and approve
You're sent to Recharge's own sign-in page, then a consent screen showing what you're allowing. Approve it and the tools appear.
- 3
Ask something small
Start with a read-only question like “how many days do I have left?” Once that works, try booking one day.
If you're a manager, the same connection also gets you the team tools, so you can ask “who's off today?” without opening anything. Each person connects with their own login, so a team can all use the same URL without sharing access.
Frequently asked
If you try it and something feels off, or there's a prompt it should handle and doesn't, tell us. This is early, and the useful feedback is the sentence you typed that didn't work.