Affonso Platform Help

Affonso is affiliate/referral software for SaaS at the budget end of the Stripe-native cohort
(Tolt, Rewardful, FirstPromoter, Tapfiliate). Its distinguishing feature is the automation surface:
a 78-endpoint REST API, 21 signed webhook events, an MCP server, a TypeScript SDK and a CLI.

Step 1 — Gather context

If references/learnings.md exists, read it first for accumulated platform knowledge.

Establish these before answering. Skip-ahead rule: if the user's prompt already contains enough context, go to Step 2.

1. What are they trying to do? Launch a program · fix attribution/tracking · build an integration · choose a plan ·
   compare Affonso to another platform · debug something that already broke
2. Which plan are they on? Launch · Growth · Elite · Enterprise · not signed up yet. This is decisive — several
   capabilities they may assume are available are tier-gated (see Gotchas).
3. Which billing provider? Stripe · Paddle Billing · Polar.sh · Creem.io · Dodo Payments · something else (which means
   server-side conversions via the API, not native ingestion)
4. Which interface do they want to drive it from? Dashboard UI · REST API · MCP server in Claude Code/Cursor · CLI ·
   Zapier/Make/n8n
5. Is money already moving? A live program with real affiliates constrains what you can safely change; commission and
   payout edits are visible to partners.

Step 2 — Route or answer directly

If the question is not actually Affonso-specific, route rather than answer:

When routing, give the exact command: "This is a program-strategy question — run:
/sales-affiliate-program {user's original question}"

Step 3 — Affonso platform reference

Read references/platform-guide.md for the full reference — module-by-module automation surface,
pricing and plan gates, data model with JSON shapes, three quick-start recipes (server-side Stripe
conversions, webhook verification, ledger export), and integration patterns.

Read references/affonso-api-reference.md for the verbatim vendor docs: all 78 endpoints with
parameters, the 21 webhook event payloads, MCP tool list, CLI commands, and SDK usage. It opens with
live-probe results and enrichment (auth quick-start, pagination, error shapes, retry snippet).

Answer from the relevant section only. Do not dump either file.

Step 4 — Actionable guidance

You no longer need the reference files — focus on the user's specific situation.

• MANDATORY CLOSING LINE — never omit it. If your answer mentions any price, plan name, tier, or plan-gated feature,
  it must end with a sentence marking that information as best-effort and pointing at the live page, e.g.:
  "Plan gates and pricing here are best-effort from research — confirm current tiers at https://affonso.io/pricing."
  This applies even when the user never asked about pricing. An answer that names a gate without this line is incomplete.
• State plan gates before writing any integration code. If the user is on Launch, tell them explicitly that the MCP
  server needs Growth or higher, while the REST API, webhooks, SDK and CLI all work on Launch — then recommend the CLI
  or REST API as the no-extra-cost substitute rather than an upgrade. Do the same for event tracking, multi-level
  commissions, pay-per-lead, managed payouts and Segment, which are all Growth+.
• Flag the currency mismatch whenever tiers come up: prices are quoted in EUR while the affiliate-revenue caps that set
  the tier are quoted in USD, so a program near a cap should leave FX headroom.
• For any conversion-tracking work, insist on external_event_id and say what it must be: the payment provider's own
  stable event/order/invoice ID, never a freshly generated UUID or timestamp. If duplicate commissions already exist, tell
  them to reverse the surplus with POST /v1/conversions/{id}/refund rather than deleting records, so the partner-visible
  ledger stays coherent.
• Recommend webhooks over polling. Affonso has 21 real webhook events, so an event-driven listener is the right
  architecture; reserve polling for backfills and reconciliation. Tell them to return 2xx fast, process asynchronously, and
  dedupe on event.id, because a non-2xx reply triggers five retries over roughly two hours. When the user is weighing
  Affonso against Tolt, say plainly that Tolt ships no webhooks and forces polling.
• Never put an API key in client-side code. Pixel and embed tokens belong in the browser; the sk_live_ key is
  server-side only. Recommend a key scoped to just the permissions the job needs.
• Say when Affonso cannot do something. There is no native HubSpot or Salesforce connector and no
  self-serve SSO on any tier — do not imply otherwise.

If you discover a gotcha, workaround, or tip not covered in references/learnings.md, append it there.

Gotchas

Best-effort from research (2026-07) — review these, especially items about plan-gated features and
integration gotchas that may be outdated.

1. The MCP server is Growth-gated; the rest of the developer surface is not. REST API, webhooks, TypeScript SDK and CLI
   are all included on the entry Launch plan, but MCP requires Growth or higher. Anyone expecting to manage the program from
   Claude Code on the cheapest plan should use the CLI or REST API instead of upgrading. Always label this gate as
   best-effort and link https://affonso.io/pricing when you state it — it is the claim most likely to have changed.
2. external_event_id is the anti-double-pay key. POST /v1/conversions requires it and it must be stable across
   retries. Use the provider's ID (Stripe in_…/evt_…, Paddle transaction ID). A new UUID per attempt turns one
   replayed billing webhook into two paid commissions.
3. Verify webhook signatures against the raw request body. X-Affonso-Signature is t=…,v1=… HMAC-SHA256. Frameworks
   that parse and re-serialize JSON before you verify (e.g. express.json()) change the bytes and break the HMAC. The
   signing secret is a different credential from the API key — whsec_… per endpoint, not sk_live_… — and is shown
   only once at endpoint creation. Webhook endpoints must be HTTPS; HTTP is rejected at configuration time.
4. partnershipStatus can be null. That is not an error — it means the affiliate exists but has not completed
   onboarding for that program. Code that switches on APPROVED/PENDING/REJECTED without a null branch silently
   drops half-onboarded partners.
5. The sk_dev_ sandbox is contradicted across the vendor's own docs. The Authentication page marks it "coming soon"
   while the MCP page presents it as usable. Assume there is no working sandbox until a sk_dev_ key actually issues, and
   never point tests at the program that pays real affiliates.
6. X-RateLimit-* headers are advertised but not always sent. They are listed in access-control-expose-headers yet
   were absent on unauthenticated 401s. Treat them as optional and fall back to fixed backoff, not a thrown error.
7. Rate limits and revenue caps are both plan-scaled. 300 req/min on Launch up to 3,000 on Enterprise — a backfill
   sized for the top tier will throttle on the bottom one.
8. sale_amount is in major units. Send 99.00, not 9900. Stripe hands you cents; divide by 100.
9. No native CRM connector. Affiliate data reaches HubSpot/Salesforce only via webhooks plus Zapier/Make/n8n.

Related skills

• /sales-affiliate-program — Commission structures, partner recruitment, onboarding, fraud policy, and program strategy across every affiliate platform. Install: npx skills add sales-skills/sales --skill sales-affiliate-program -a claude-code
• /sales-tolt — The closest price peer: flat-priced SaaS affiliate software with a native MCP server but no webhooks, so integrations must poll
• /sales-promotekit — The cheaper Stripe-only peer: free tier and real Svix webhooks, but no idempotency key on writes and it neither pays affiliates nor files 1099s
• /sales-growsurf — Referral and affiliate software with an in-product JS SDK, Stripe-native triggering, automated 1099 filing
• /sales-referralhero — Full-stack referral/affiliate with multi-level Level 1/2/3 tracking, coupon groups
• /sales-checkout — Optimize the checkout page affiliate traffic lands on
• /sales-funnel — Design the offer and funnel affiliates promote
• /sales-email-marketing — Build the affiliate onboarding and nurture sequences
• /sales-refgrow — Peer that embeds the affiliate dashboard inside your product and ingests Polar/Dodo as well as Stripe/Paddle, but runs payouts dashboard-only and ships docs that contradict the shipped product
• /sales-do — Not sure which skill to use? The router matches any sales objective to the right skill. Install: npx skills add sales-skills/sales --skill sales-do -a claude-code

Examples

Example 1: "My affiliates aren't getting credited for sales"

User: "Affiliates send traffic and people buy, but half the commissions never show up in Affonso."

Approach: Cookie-only attribution is the usual culprit — cross-device purchases and ad-blocked
pixels never register. Establish whether they are relying on the browser pixel alone. The fix is to add
server-side conversions: keep the pixel for click capture and window.Affonso.signup(email) on
registration, then POST to /v1/conversions from the billing webhook, resolving the referral by
customer_id or external_user_id. Insist on the provider's invoice ID as external_event_id. Also
have them serve the pixel through their own domain via the documented proxy setup if ad blockers are
suspected. Mention that Launch-tier sale_amount mistakes (cents vs major units) show up as
wrong-sized commissions rather than missing ones, so check both symptoms.

Example 2: "Can I run this from Claude Code on the cheapest plan?"

User: "I'm on the €15 plan. How do I get Affonso into Claude Code so I can approve affiliates by
asking?"

Approach: Answer the gate directly: the MCP server requires Growth or higher, so the entry plan will
not connect. But the REST API and CLI are on the entry plan, so they lose nothing important — install
@affonso/cli, run affonso login, and drive affonso affiliates from Claude Code, or call
/v1/affiliates with a key scoped to read:affiliates + write:affiliates. Show the MCP command
(claude mcp add --transport http --scope user affonso https://api.affonso.io/mcp then
claude mcp login affonso) as the path if they do upgrade, and flag pricing as best-effort against
https://affonso.io/pricing.

Example 3: Automation — "Sync new affiliates into our CRM"

User: "When someone joins our affiliate program I want a contact created in HubSpot automatically."

Approach: There is no native HubSpot connector, so say that first. The route is webhooks: subscribe
to affiliate.created and affiliate.confirmed, copy the whsec_ secret, and either pipe to HubSpot
via Zapier/Make/n8n or write a listener. Walk through HMAC verification against the raw body, returning
2xx fast and processing async, and deduping on event.id because failed deliveries retry five times
over roughly two hours. Recommend setting external_user_id on each affiliate so the CRM record can be
matched back without storing Affonso IDs everywhere.

Troubleshooting

Commissions paid twice for the same purchase

Almost always a missing or unstable external_event_id on POST /v1/conversions. The field is the
idempotency key and must be byte-identical across retries of the same billing event — a per-attempt UUID
defeats it entirely. Use the payment provider's invoice, order, checkout-session or event ID. If
duplicates already exist, refund the surplus commission via POST /v1/conversions/{id}/refund rather
than deleting records, so the partner-visible ledger stays coherent. Separately, dedupe your own webhook
handler on event.id, since non-2xx responses trigger five retries.

Webhook endpoint returns 401 or signature checks always fail

Two causes dominate. First, verifying a re-serialized body: read the raw bytes
(request.get_data(), req.rawBody) before any JSON middleware touches them. Second, using the API key
instead of the webhook signing secret — they are different credentials, sk_live_ versus whsec_, and
the secret is shown only once at endpoint creation, so it may need regenerating. Confirm the endpoint is
HTTPS; HTTP is rejected outright. Check the exact signed-payload construction against the vendor snippet
in references/affonso-api-reference.md before assuming the format.

A documented feature returns an error or is missing from the dashboard

Check the plan gate before debugging the code. POST /v1/events needs Growth+ because event tracking is
tier-gated even though the endpoint docs carry no tier note; the same applies to affiliate postback URLs,
multi-level commissions, pay-per-lead, program-wide and self-service coupon codes, managed payouts,
Segment, custom domain/favicon and email invitations. Custom SSO is on no self-serve tier at all. Verify
against https://affonso.io/pricing, and note the affiliate-revenue caps that set the tier are quoted in
USD while the plan price is in EUR.

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