How to give Claude access to your own automation platform (MCP)

Alexander Krastev · 2026-09-22

MCP is a small standard that lets an AI assistant use someone else's software: the software publishes a list of things it can do, and the assistant calls them. AIK publishes such a list, so you can sit in Claude and say "run my invoice workflow" or "build me an agent that watches this mailbox", and it happens in your own installation.

What it can and cannot do

Thirty-six operations are published. They cover reading (workflows, agents, runs, files, your documentation), building (create an agent or a workflow, audit a process), editing, and doing (run a workflow or an agent, process documents).

Three things are deliberately not published, and will not be:

everything the assistant builds arrives switched off, and an inactive workflow refuses to run for real until a person turns it on.

Connecting it

In AIK: Settings → API Keys, create a key, and open the Connect Claude box. It writes out the exact line for the terminal version of Claude and the exact configuration block for the desktop app, with your own installation's address already filled in. Copy, paste, restart the app.

Two things that trip people up. An installation on your own laptop can only be reached by the app running on that laptop — the hosted assistant in a browser calls from the vendor's servers and will never see localhost. And if you have both a hosted and a local installation, they need different names, because the assistant keeps one entry per name and the first one wins.

Disconnecting is revoking the key.

Who pays for the thinking

The runs happen in your installation, so they use the model you configured, on your key, billed as usual. There was an attempt to let a paid assistant subscription pay for the run instead; as of 16 September 2026 neither Claude app answers that request, so AIK says so in the run report and bills the usual way rather than pretending. If the apps start supporting it, the switch is already there.

Is it safe

The key is the same kind you would give any integration, it acts only as its owner, every call is written to the run history and costs are recorded like any other run. Revoke the key and the door closes.

Trying it

You can try AIK for free at aikautomation.com and connect it in two minutes. To have it on your own computer or server you buy a licence and we install it for you. Get in touch.

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