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OverviewConcepts

Agents

Authorize autonomous agents to act for customers

Agents are created by developers using Natural to enable autonomous Payments workflows. Developers can use agents to request payment authority from their customers, represented by another Party. Developers can also use their own Party to send payments on behalf of themselves.

A developer can register multiple agents on Natural, each of which can execute on behalf of multiple parties on Natural. Each agent-customer pair can have granular permissions and limits, managed through an agent-customer relationship requested by the developer and approved by the customer. Developers and their customers can subsequently update or revoke that relationship via the Dashboard or API.

Not building the agent runtime yourself? Connect Claude, Cursor, or another MCP client to Natural via the MCP connector with an API key — the agent runs inside the host app and calls Natural’s tools directly.

Agent customer model

Alice (Developer) adds Bruce (Business) as a customer for one of her agents with specific permissions and limits. Bruce reviews and approves the agent-customer relationship:

1. Alice (Developer)
   └─ Creates Agent (Carrier Payment Agent)
   └─ Adds Bruce as a customer for the agent
       └─ Permissions: [payments.create, payments.read]
       └─ Limit: $1000 per transaction
2. Bruce (Business)
   └─ Approves the agent-customer relationship
3. Alice (Developer)
   └─ Uses Agent to pay Terri (Contractor) on behalf of Bruce

Agent-customer relationships can include the following permissions:

  • payments.create — Create payments
  • payments.read — Read payment status
  • wallets.read — Check wallet balance
  • wallets.update — Modify wallet settings
  • party.read — View party information
  • party.update — Modify party details

Agents operate within a configurable per-transaction limit — the maximum amount for any single payment.

When an agent attempts to exceed its limit, the transaction is blocked and an escalation is raised — the party’s owners and admins are notified by dashboard and email to approve or deny it.

Agent authentication

Agents authenticate via our SDKs using API keys that the developer owns, allowing Natural to verify the agent has permission to act on behalf of the business party. When using agent authentication (X-Agent-ID), developers must also provide an instance_id (X-Instance-ID) for transaction observability.

  • Parties — Entities that agents act on behalf of
  • Wallets — Balance management for agent operations
  • Payments — Transactions executed by agents