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5 min read•Updated August 2026

Introduction & Getting Started

Welcome to the Rook Developer Portal. Rook provides modern, cloud-native financial infrastructure designed for commercial banks, software platforms, and fintech developers to embed card issuing, real-time FedNow payments, and double-entry ledgers into their products.

The Rook Entity Model

Before making API calls, understanding Rook’s mental model will help you structure your integration. Every resource in Rook is organized into a hierarchical multi-tenant structure:

ROOK HIERARCHICAL ENTITY RELATIONSHIPSTRICT TENANT ISOLATION
LEVEL 1OrganizationTop-Level Entity

Represents your master commercial legal entity. Holds corporate billing, bank sponsor agreements, developer apps, and production API credentials.

↓ 1:N Relationship
LEVEL 2Programs (Program Perimeters)X-Program-ID

Logical risk, compliance, and ledger isolation perimeters (e.g. Commercial Cards Program, Payroll Payouts). All API requests must specify the target program via the X-Program-ID header.

↓ 1:N Relationship
LEVEL 3ADepository Accounts

FDIC-insured checking accounts, virtual account numbers, and routing numbers.

LEVEL 3BDouble-Entry Ledgers

Immutable balance journals with cryptographic debit/credit balancing.

↓ Resources
LEVEL 4Payment Rails & Instruments

Virtual & physical commercial cards, Apple/Android Pay tokens, FedNow instant transfers, Same-Day ACH batches, and real-time HMAC webhooks.

How to Choose Your Path

Depending on what your software platform needs to accomplish, jump directly to the relevant track:

Commercial Credit & Debit

Hierarchical corporate credit lines, multi-card sub-limits, and automated sweeps.

Expense Management

Real-time MCC categorization, automated receipt matching, and ERP ledger sync.

Authentication & Multi-Tenancy Headers

Every authenticated request to the Rook API requires two core security headers:

  1. Authorization: Bearer <API_KEY>: Your sandbox or production API credential.
  2. X-Program-ID: <PROGRAM_UUID>: The unique identifier of your program perimeter.
curl -X GET "https://api.sandbox.rookpayments.com/v1/accounts" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer rk_sandbox_8f92a10b4c7e" \
  -H "X-Program-ID: 7c9e6679-7425-40de-944b-e07fc1f90ae7"

Next Steps

Ready to execute your first transaction?

Follow our step-by-step Quickstart guide to create a developer app, obtain sandbox credentials, and execute an authenticated transaction.

Continue to Quickstart: First API Call →
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