ECRS Third-Party Integration & API Guidance
ECRS Integration Philosophy with APIs
ECRS supports an open, API‑friendly ecosystem while prioritizing platform stability, scalability, and long‑term maintainability for our retail customers.
To balance these objectives, ECRS emphasizes:
- Standardized, reusable APIs rather than custom or partner‑specific integrations
- Customer‑driven development based on confirmed, real‑world needs
- Production‑proven solutions before considering broader partnership discussions
This approach enables ECRS to support a large and diverse integration community while minimizing unnecessary technical debt. This guidance is intended to provide clarity and set expectations for third‑party integrations. It does not create contractual obligations, guarantees of development, or commitments to partnership or commercial arrangements.
Standard API Approach
ECRS provides a set of generic Application Programming Interface (API) endpoints designed to support common operational and retail use cases.
- When an API already exists for a given use case, third parties may integrate using that endpoint, provided the applicable ECRS customer has licensed the API.
- APIs are designed to be generic and reusable. ECRS does not offer exclusive, proprietary, or partner‑specific APIs.
- Third parties are responsible for building and maintaining their integrations against ECRS’ standard interfaces.
Typical API Integration Workflow
While individual situations may vary, API integrations with ECRS commonly follow this path:
- Identify Use Cases – The integrator outlines the specific use cases they wish to support.
- Customer Sponsorship (If New APIs are Required) – If the identified use cases require APIs that do not already exist, an active ECRS customer must sponsor and fund the development, with a confirmed intent to deploy the solution in production.
- Review Existing APIs – ECRS reviews the proposed use cases to determine which are already supported by existing standard APIs and which may require customer‑sponsored development.
- Integration to New and/or Existing APIs – The integrator builds against the provided generic ECRS APIs which may include, but are not limited to, new or existing APIs.
- Production Validation – The solution is demonstrated in operation at a live ECRS customer location.
Requests for New APIs
If an API does not already exist for a desired use case, ECRS may consider developing one under the following conditions detailed below. Once developed, new APIs become part of the standard ECRS platform and may be reused by other third parties and CATAPULT retailers under the same general framework and licensing model.
- Defined Use Case – The requesting party must provide a clear and specific description of the business use cases requiring API support that are not yet fulfilled by existing ECRS APIs.
- Customer Sponsorship – An active ECRS customer must require the functionality for their own operations and be willing to sponsor and fund the development effort.
- Confirmed Deployment Intent – API development is expected to be tied to a real customer deployment. ECRS generally does not pursue speculative development for uncommitted or hypothetical use cases.
Partnership Discussions
ECRS is open to discussing potential partnerships once a third‑party solution:
- Integrates using standard ECRS APIs, and
- Is proven to function successfully in a real production environment at an ECRS customer site.
Completion of an integration does not imply endorsement, exclusivity, or partnership status.
Technical Oversight
ECRS maintains ownership and governance of its APIs, including design, versioning, and lifecycle management. APIs may evolve over time as part of the ECRS product roadmap.
Third parties are responsible for maintaining compatibility with supported API versions and adapting their integrations as APIs change.
Point of Contact
For all matters related to API development and third‑party integration discussions, third parties should work through the ECRS Account Representative assigned to the ECRS customer sponsoring the API development. That Account Representative will coordinate internally with the appropriate ECRS product and engineering teams as needed.
Available ECRS APIs
ECRS® offers Representational State Transfer (REST) API solutions that allow ECRS merchants and/or their chosen third parties to interface with data within the CATAPULT and/or Cognition databases. These REST API solutions are:
- CATAPULT® Passport API
- CATAPULT Cognition™ API
- CATAPULT WebCart™ API
- Digital Coupon and External Loyalty API Client
- Instant Item Detail API Client
- Loyalty Redemption API
- Receipt Survey API
- Third Party Price Computing Scale API Client
More details on each API, and access to the documentation for each, can be found in the corresponding sections below.
CATAPULT® Passport API
The CATAPULT Passport API is a RESTful API that provides a number of endpoints to bidirectionally move data (import and export) between the CATAPULT® database and third-party retail systems. Examples of endpoints in the Passport API include managing Purchase Orders from start to finish, getting information about items within the CATAPULT database, and updating the details of customer records within the CATAPULT database.
CATAPULT Cognition™ API
The CATAPULT Cognition API is a secure, RESTful interface that enables access to transactional data used across CATAPULT system applications, as well as AI-generated predictive data. Use of the API requires an ECRS–issued API key.
Predictive Endpoints
Access to data generated by Cognition’s AI services is available via multiple endpoints including:
- Product recommendations (e.g., similar or related items)
- Cognition Artemis™ personalized recommendations (e.g., customer-specific coupons or item suggestions)
- DemandFill™ 3.0 item demand forecasts
Transaction History Endpoint
Transactional data generated by CATAPULT is available through the Transaction History Endpoint.
CATAPULT WebCart™ API
The WebCart API supports the CATAPULT WebCart™ user interface, providing a robust and flexible framework for integrating and managing various e-commerce functionalities. This API also enables the creation of custom e-commerce solutions through various endpoints which control essential functions such as signing in/out, adding items to a cart, and accepting payment. An active WebCart license is required for this API to function properly.
This documentation is currently under development. Request documentation for undocumented endpoints by contacting the Web Transactions team at ECRS.
Beta – CATAPULT WebCart API
5.8.167 – CATAPULT WebCart API
5.7.158 – CATAPULT WebCart API
Digital Coupon and External Loyalty API Client
The Digital Coupon and External Loyalty API Client is a RESTful API Client that can be leveraged to allow CATAPULT Point of Sale (POS) terminals and CATAPULT WebCart™ sites to interact with external digital coupon and loyalty providers. Note that this truly is an API Client, and any third party who intends to use it must create a server for the POS Terminals and/or WebCart sites to submit requests to.
Instant Item Detail API Client
The Instant Item Detail API Client allows for any service connected to the client to automatically receive new and updated inventory item data from the CATAPULT Database. This flow of data ensures that any connected service has the most up-to-date item information for use in their desired application. Note that this is truly an API Client; any service provider that chooses to use it must create a server that can receive and process the information.
Loyalty Redemption API
The Loyalty Redemption API is a RESTful API that provides the capability to check and decrease the loyalty balances for customers within the CATAPULT database.
Receipt Survey API
The Receipt Survey API is a RESTful API that empowers CATAPULT merchants to enhance their shopper’s receipts with images – such as barcodes, QR codes, or promotional graphics – generated by a third-party web service when specific transaction criteria are met.
Third Party Price Computing Scale API Client
The Third Party Price Computing Scale API Client allows for third party scales and scale management systems to seamlessly be powered by CATAPULT. Users of this API Client will automatically receive new and updated inventory item data, including images, from a store’s CATAPULT database. This flow of data ensures scales have the most up-to-date item information for use when processing weighted items at the scale. Note that this is truly an API Client; any third party that chooses to use it must create a server that can receive and process the information.