Create rules

Creates or updates one auto-categorization rule, keyed by its pattern — writing a pattern that already exists REPLACES that row's category and priority.

POST /v1/books/rules

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Address	`https://api.hanzo.ai/v1/books/rules`
Method	`POST`
Operation	`post_books_rules`
Auth	`Authorization: Bearer $HANZO_API_KEY`

Creates or updates one auto-categorization rule, keyed by its pattern — writing a pattern that already exists REPLACES that row's category and priority. The category is normalized to a real COA expense account, and anything unrecognized becomes 5900 Uncategorized rather than a guessed real account. It answers the row exactly as stored, so the caller sees the normalization. A rule overrides a vendor's default category, so this is the standing instruction that decides how a future bill classifies.

Request

3 fields, body application/json (required).

Field	In	Type	Required	Description
`category`	body	string	—	Category is the COA expense account a matching bill books to.
`pattern`	body	string	—	Pattern is the merchant substring the rule matches on, case-insensitively.
`priority`	body	integer (int64)	—	Priority breaks ties: when several patterns match, the highest wins.

Response

Status	Body	Meaning
`200`	books.Rule	ok
`default`	problem-details	refused

200 body — 3 fields.

Field	In	Type	Always	Description
`category`	body	string	—	Category is the COA expense account a matching bill books to.
`pattern`	body	string	—	Pattern is the merchant substring the rule matches on, case-insensitively.
`priority`	body	integer (int64)	—	Priority breaks ties: when several patterns match, the highest wins.

Failure carries the platform error shape — see Errors.

Examples

CLI

SDK

HTTP

MCP

hanzo books rules create

.ts

.py

.go

.rs

.java

import { Configuration, BooksApi } from 'hanzoai';

const api = new BooksApi(new Configuration({ accessToken: process.env.HANZO_API_KEY }));
const { data } = await api.postBooksRules({ category: "<category>", pattern: "<pattern>" });

from hanzoai.cloud import ApiClient, Configuration
from hanzoai.cloud.api import BooksApi

client = ApiClient(Configuration(access_token=os.environ["HANZO_API_KEY"]))
result = BooksApi(client).post_books_rules(category="<category>", pattern="<pattern>")

cfg := hanzoai.NewConfiguration()
cfg.AddDefaultHeader("Authorization", "Bearer "+os.Getenv("HANZO_API_KEY"))
client := hanzoai.NewAPIClient(cfg)

resp, _, err := client.BooksAPI.PostBooksRules(context.Background()).Execute()
if err != nil {
	return err
}

use hanzo_client::apis::{configuration::Configuration, books_api};

let mut cfg = Configuration::new();
cfg.bearer_access_token = std::env::var("HANZO_API_KEY").ok();

let result = books_api::post_books_rules(&cfg, Default::default()).await?;

import ai.hanzo.cloud.ApiClient;
import ai.hanzo.cloud.api.BooksApi;

ApiClient client = new ApiClient();
client.setBearerToken(System.getenv("HANZO_API_KEY"));

var result = new BooksApi(client).postBooksRules();

curl -X POST https://api.hanzo.ai/v1/books/rules \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $HANZO_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
       "category": "<category>",
       "pattern": "<pattern>"
     }'

MCP reaches books through the books tool, which names its 20 operations with its own verbs — this one among them, under a name only MCP declares. describe explains any of them:

curl -X POST https://api.hanzo.ai/v1/mcp \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
       "jsonrpc": "2.0",
       "id": 1,
       "method": "tools/call",
       "params": {
         "name": "describe",
         "arguments": {
           "op": "list_book_accounts"
         }
       }
     }'

Books API · All Hanzo APIs · Interactive reference

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