Set, check, or remove Azure spending budgets for customers in Partner Center

Appropriate roles: Admin agent

Manage Azure spending effectively to maximize your customers' cloud investments. Partner Center empowers you to stay proactive. Here's how:

1. Set Azure spending budgets

To track expenses and prevent unexpected overages, create custom Azure spending budgets in Partner Center:

• Track expenses: Align actual spending with planned limits.
• Avoid surprises: Receive alerts as customers approach budget thresholds.
• Improve forecasting: Use historical data to set realistic and actionable targets.

2. Compare actual vs. budget

Regularly reviewing spending against budgets allows you to:

• Identify issues early: Spot overages or underutilization before they escalate.
• Adjust plans: Shift resources to high-priority workloads dynamically.
• Educate customers: Share insights to refine their financial strategies.

3. Monitor usage

Beyond budgets, continuous monitoring helps you:

• Detect cost spikes: Flag misconfigured resources like oversized virtual machines or orphaned storage. Guide customers to right-size resources.
• Analyze trends: Understand usage patterns to predict future needs and schedule cleanup of unused resources.
• Enhance security: Spot suspicious activity, such as unexpected data egress, and automate scaling by shutting down dev/test environments after hours.

4. Turn insights into action

To maximize effectiveness, follow these steps:

• Set budgets: Define limits based on workload priorities.
• Review regularly: Track progress using Partner Center's Azure spending page.
• Configure notification: Enable alerts for budget thresholds and unexpected anomalies.
• Optimize continuously: Provide cost-saving recommendations to customers.

Benefits of setting up Azure spending budget

Setting up budgets offers significant benefits:

• Build trust: Transparent budgeting builds customer confidence.
• Increase efficiency: Proactive monitoring reduces firefighting.
• Foster growth: Eliminate waste to free up funds for innovation.

By integrating budgets and monitoring into your workflow, you transform Azure spending budget management from a reactive task into a strategic advantage.

Note

This feature is unavailable in sandbox or Test in Production (TiP) accounts.

Azure spending data

Azure spending estimates in Partner Center help you anticipate your Azure costs, but they aren't your final invoice. Here's how to interpret and act on this data:

• Daily updates: Estimates refresh every 24 hours to reflect the latest usage.
• Exclusions: Taxes, credits, or other fees aren't included in the estimates—your final invoices reflect these adjustments.
• Billing continuity: Services continue to work uninterrupted even if costs exceed the budget, and you're billed for all active Azure services until canceled.
• Usage reset: Usage costs reset at the end of each billing period.

Set an Azure spending budget for legacy Microsoft Azure subscriptions

You can set an Azure spending budget for customers with legacy Microsoft Azure subscriptions in Partner Center:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.

2. Select Azure spending.

3. Find the customers and select the desired customers for budget setting on this page.

4. Enter a value for budget.

5. Select Apply to save your changes.

You can set a budget for an individual customer in their subscription settings.

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Customers workspace.

2. Select the customer's Company name.

3. On the customer's Subscriptions page, under Usage-based subscription, choose Change budget.

4. Enter a value for the budget.

5. Select Apply to save your changes.

You can remove the Azure spending budget for your customers in Partner Center.

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.

2. Select Azure spending.

3. Select the customer whose budget you want to remove.

4. Select Remove budget.

You can track your customers' current Azure spending and budgets at any time.

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.

2. Select Azure spending.

3. Review the budget, current spending, and budget percentage for each customer.

How to access the new Azure spending (NCE) page

To access the Azure spending page for the new commerce experience (NCE):

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.
2. Select Azure spending (NCE) from the task menu on the left side.
3. Manage your customers' budgets for Azure plan subscriptions by setting, adjusting, or removing them on this page to ensure cost efficiency and prevent overspending.

Note

The new page displays only customers who have an active Azure plan and are currently working with the partner. If they stop working with the partner, they no longer appear on this page.

By following these steps, you should be able to efficiently navigate the new interface and manage your customers' Azure spending budgets.

Set an Azure spending budget using the new (NCE) page.

To set an Azure spending budget for your customers:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.
2. Select Azure spending (NCE) from the task menu on the left side.
3. Go to the Customers section and select New budget.
4. Set new budgets by searching for customer names in the side panel.
5. Select Save.

To update the budget for your customers:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.
2. Select Azure spending (NCE) from the task menu on the left side.
3. Select the customers by checking the boxes next to their names in the Customers section.
4. Select Update budget.
5. View customer names and budgets in the side panel.
6. Update the budget amount for each customer.
7. Select Save.

To remove the budget for your customers:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.
2. Select Azure spending (NCE) from the task menu on the left side.
3. Select the customers by checking the boxes next to their names in the Customers section.
4. Select Update budget.
5. View customer names and budgets in the side panel.
6. Clear the budget field for the customer.
7. Select Save.

To monitor your customers' Azure expenses and budgets:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.
2. Select Azure spending (NCE) from the task menu on the left side.
3. Review the customers' budgets, current estimates, and percentage of budget used so far in the Customers section.

Important

Estimates of resource usage are typically one day behind the actual usage. Occasionally, specific circumstances might briefly extend this timeline. Even if estimates exceed the budget, services continue running smoothly until you cancel the subscription.

Notifications for budget limits

To help you manage your customers' Azure spending effectively, set up email alerts. These alerts notify you when spending approaches a specific amount. You receive an email every seven days once usage hits between 80% and 100% of the budget. This proactive approach helps you to monitor costs, avoid unexpected charges, and ensure customers stay within their budget.

To configure these alerts:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Notifications (bell) icon.

2. Select My preferences.

3. Configure a preferred email address.

4. Configure the preferred language for the notification.

5. Select all boxes under the Notification preferences section in the Billing workspace.

Note

You don't get a notification if the budget exceeds 100%. However, services continue run smoothly until you cancel the subscription.

By following these steps, you can stay informed and manage your customers' Azure spending efficiently.

Itemized costs by service

You can view itemized costs (and estimated usage) by service for usage-based subscriptions:

1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Customers workspace.

2. Select the customer's Company name.

3. Go to the customer's Subscriptions page.

4. Select the Subscription name under Usage-based subscriptions.

5. Review Itemized costs by service and Estimated usage for the current billing period on the subscription page.

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• New commerce experience in Cloud Solution Provider program (CSP) - Azure billing