Bamboohr

BambooHR is an HRIS platform for SMBs covering employee records, time-off management, onboarding checklists, performance reviews, and payroll integrations. Its REST API enables: reading the employee directory and individual employee records (name, email, department, manager, start date), querying time-off requests and balances, submitting time-off requests programmatically, generating custom reports, and triggering webhooks on employee events (new hire, termination, field change). For agents automating HR workflows (user provisioning on hire/terminate, team roster queries), BambooHR is the most widely used SMB HRIS API. Confidence is docs-derived.

REST API at api.bamboohr.com/api/gateway.php/{companyDomain}/v1. Resources: employees, time_off, reports, meta. GET /employees/directory returns the full employee directory (configurable fields). GET /employees/{id} returns individual employee record. GET /employees/{id}/time_off/requests returns time-off requests. POST /time_off/requests creates a new time-off request. POST /reports/custom generates a custom report (field selection via POST body). Response payloads are JSON or XML (Accept header). Pagination via last_changed for employee sync.

HTTP Basic Auth using API key as username (password: x). API keys generated per BambooHR user in account settings → API Keys. Keys provide full account access; no per-resource scoping. HTTPS enforced. Webhook secret available for HMAC-SHA256 verification of outbound webhook payloads. SCIM 2.0 supported for identity provider provisioning (separate auth). API key rotation via user settings.

Standard HTTP status codes with XML or JSON error bodies depending on Accept header. 403 for invalid API key, 404 for missing employee, 400 for validation errors. API rate limit: approximately 400 API calls per 5 minutes per company. Webhook retries: 3 attempts with exponential backoff on delivery failure. BambooHR SaaS uptime not publicly detailed; enterprise SLA available. Report generation for large datasets may be slow; async not available for reports endpoint.

documentation.bamboohr.com provides API reference for all supported endpoints, authentication guide, webhook configuration, SCIM provisioning guide, and custom report field reference. Documentation is adequate and regularly updated. Getting started requires a BambooHR account (free trial available) and API key. No official SDKs; community-maintained Python and Ruby clients available. Support via BambooHR support portal.