Starting a charging session

Intermediate

OCPI 2.1.1

Technical details off

The messages from a card tap to an active Session: the token is authorized, then the CPO pushes the new Session to the eMSP.

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Who takes part in a charging session

Starting a charging session

Real-time updates during charging

Finishing the charging session

Order the charging session messages

Let's see what happens when you start charging!

What You'll Learn:

How the CPO can ask the eMSP to authorize a Token in real time
What the eMSP answers
How the CPO pushes the new Session to the eMSP

The Players in This Lesson:

CPO

eMSP

EMSP

Message Flow:

Step 0 of 2

CPO

POST /tokens/{token_uid}/authorize

eMSP

Message: Real-time authorization

Details: When the eMSP has its Tokens authorized in real time, the CPO asks the eMSP whether a Token may charge, optionally at a given Location. The eMSP answers with an AuthorizationInfo object, and ALLOWED means the Token may charge.

Response: {"status_code": 1000, "data": {"allowed": "ALLOWED"}, "timestamp": "2026-10-16T09:30:00Z"}

"An eMSP might want their Tokens to be authorizated 'real-time', not white-listed. For this the eMSP has to implement the POST Authorize request and set the Token.whitelist field to `NEVER` for Tokens they want to have authorized 'real-time'."OCPI 2.1.1 Tokens module · #13-real-time-authorization"Do a 'real-time' authorization request to the eMSP system, validating if a Token might be used (at the optionally given Location)."OCPI 2.1.1 Tokens module · #222-post-method"The endpoint response contains a AuthorizationInfo object."OCPI 2.1.1 Tokens module · #222-post-method"|ALLOWED |This Token is allowed to charge at this location."OCPI 2.1.1 Tokens module · #41-allowed-enum"Response code, as listed in Status Codes, indicates how the request was handled. To avoid confusion with HTTP codes, at least four digits are used."OCPI 2.1.1 Transport and format chapter · #response-format"|1000 |Generic success code"OCPI 2.1.1 Status codes chapter · #1xxx-success

CPO

PUT /sessions/{country_code}/{party_id}/{session_id}

eMSP

Message: New Session

Details: The CPO pushes the Session it just created to the eMSP's Sessions endpoint.

Response: {"status_code": 1000, "timestamp": "2026-10-16T09:30:00Z"}

"When the CPO creates a Session object they push it to the eMSPs by calling PUT on the eMSPs Sessions endpoint with the newly created Session object."OCPI 2.1.1 Sessions module · #11-push-model

What OCPI 2.1.1 defines for this lesson

Modules in this version

Locations

Sessions

CDRs

Tariffs

Tokens

Commands

Credentials

Hub Client Info

Charging Profiles

Payments

Bookings

No advertised interface-role field

Endpoint descriptions name the module and URL without an interface-role field.

The header carries the token value

The request header carries the shared credentials token value.

Session ID uses case-sensitive text

The Session ID uses text whose letter case matters.