Intermittent 401 "Missing scopes: api.responses.write" on Responses API — works on retry

ChatGPT Apps SDK
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We’re experiencing an intermittent 401 error when calling the Responses API (openai.responses.create()) in our production application. The exact error:

You have insufficient permissions for this operation. Missing scopes: api.responses.write.
Check that you have the correct role in your organization (Reader, Writer, Owner)
and project (Member, Owner), and if you’re using a restricted API key, that it has
the necessary scopes.

Behavior:

  • The error occurs randomly — not on every request, and not tied to a specific user, model, or input.

  • When a user retries the exact same message with the same API key, it succeeds.

  • No changes are made to the API key, SDK config, or request payload between the failure and the successful retry.

  • The same API key works perfectly with other endpoints (e.g., openai.vectorStores.search()).

    Is the OpenAI team aware of this transient scope enforcement issue on the Responses API? Any timeline for a fix?

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3 posts were merged into an existing topic: Intermittent 401 scope errors on key with “All” permissions — spikes randomly, no config changes