Azure Alerts

Azure Alerts

Azure alerts allow you to stay on top of Azure usage. There are currently two alert policies:
  1. Budget Alerts - these allow you to set a budget for an Azure Entitlement, and be alerted when the usage of that Entitlement reaches a certain percentage of the budget;
  1. Unexpected Consumption Alerts  - these allow you to keep track of unexpected daily spikes of usage in any given Azure Entitlement.


Things to keep in mind

  1. There is usually a delay of 24 to 36 hours between the usage and the alert being sent
  2. Usage is measured based on your revenue/sell price
  3. Alerts are sent for all entitlements under your context
    1. If you are a CSP, alerts may be triggered by all Entitlements
    2. If you are a reseller, alerts may be triggered by all Entitlements of your customers
  4. If two alerts of the same policy trigger for an Entitlement, only the highest value will be sent by email

Budget Alerts

Budget alerts are sent by email when an Azure Entitlement usage exceeds the threshold of its budget. They are useful when you want to keep track of deviations from regular usage.

These can help you stay on top of situations where Azure usage rises slowly due to unforeseen circumstances, such as:
  1. Customer provisions Azure resources without understanding their pricing, leading to an overall higher spend;
  2. Customer starts using their resources more intensively without realizing it.
Budget alerts consist of two components, the Azure Entitlement budget, and the Alert configurations.

How to set up an Azure Entitlement budget

Setting up an Azure Entitlement budget is simple. On the subscription page for the parent Azure Plan, follow the steps:
  1. Under the desired entitlement listing, click Actions
  2. Then click "Set Monthly Budget"
  3. Set the value for the monthly budget you desire
  4. Click "Submit" to save the budget



How to set up Budget Alerts

To be alerted when an Entitlement reaches a percentage of its budget, go to Administration > Settings.
On the Alerts section, follow the steps to configure the alerts:
  1. Click "Add Alert", under the "Budget Alerts" section
  2. Set the percentage of the budget at which you would like to be alerted
  3. Click "Save Changes"


Budget Alert Example

Here is an example of a month of usage with a budget alert configured.
  1. The purple line represents the subscription's usage accumulated over the cycle.
  2. The blue line represents the budget configured for the subscription.
  3. The green line represents the alert threshold for the given budget (set at 80% of the budget in this example).



Unexpected Consumption Alerts

The Unexpected Consumption Alerts work by looking at the average daily consumption of the last 7 days, and comparing the latest daily value to that average. If the daily value exceeds the threshold configured, an alert will be sent.
These can be used to prevent situations like:
  1. Many resources get provisioned and start being used due to fraud
  2. The usage of the resources spikes due to misunderstanding or lack of awareness

How to set up Unexpected Consumption Alerts

To be alerted when an Entitlement usage spikes, go to Administration > Settings.
On the Alerts section, follow the steps to configure the alerts:
  1. Click "Add Alert", under the "Unexpected Consumption Alerts" section
  2. Set the percentage of daily spike at which you would like to be alerted
  3. Click "Save Changes"


Unexpected Consumption Alert Example

Here is an example of an unexpected consumption alert being triggered.
  1. The purple line represents the subscription's daily usage.
  2. The blue line represents the rolling average of the previous 7 days.
  3. The green line represents the alert threshold. This is calculated by multiplying the percentage configured by the rolling average.



How to set up Alert receivers

As mentioned above, the alerts are sent by email. To keep the alerts relevant, these are only sent to users who really need to receive them.
To enable a user to receive the email alerts add them to the permission group "Alert Manager" or "Administrator" by following these steps:
  1. Go into Administration > Users
  2. Look for the desired user and click Actions > Edit
  3. Add the group "Alert Manager" or "Administrator" in the form and save it.
Learn more about the available User Permission Groups


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