Creating and Managing a Budget

This topic guides you to configure budgeting rules with notification mechanisms and actions required to control your cloud expenses.

Creating a New Budget

The following steps need to be performed to create a new budget rule.

1. In the Budget Management dashboard, click Create Budget button. The _Basic Budget Details _screen appears.

A graphical view of the historical and forecast spend will be displayed in the screen as per the budget period and filtered scope so that sufficient information will be available to analyze and select the Budget Amount.

In the Basic Details about your Budget section:

2. Specify a name for the budget rule in the Name field.
3. Select the type of budget to be configured from the Budget Type drop-down list. The available option is: Cost.

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Note:

Support for more options is in the pipeline.

4. Select the currency to be used for the budget rule from the Budget Currency drop-down list.
5. Specify the frequency for which the budget amount must be considered for budget control in the Budget Reset Period field.
6. Specify a date from which the budget rule must be considered in the Budget Start Date field.
7. Specify a date till which the budget rule must be considered in the Budget Expiry Date field.
8. Enable Make this recurring budget checkbox to make the budget rule a recurring event till the expiry date.

In the Budget Scope section, multiple filters are available to define the scope of budget rule:

9. Select the required tenant, for which the budget rule must be applied, from the Tenant drop-down list.

10. Select the required cloud providers, for which the budget rule must be applied, from the Cloud Provider drop-down list.

11. Select the required cloud accounts, for which the budget rule must be applied, from the Cloud Account drop-down list.

12. Click Add button. The Advanced Filter_s section will pop up with more settings to configure the _Budget Scope.

    1. Select required options (such as Service, Application, Region, Resource Group, Tags, Cost Center) from the set of drop-down lists.
    2. Select the required option from the Aggregate Costs By dropdown list. The options are: Blended Cost, Unblended Cost, and Amortized Cost.
    3. Select required options from the Support Charge Types dropdown list. The options are: Refunds, Credits, Upfront Reservation Fees, Recurring Reservation Charges, Taxes, Support Charges, Discounts, Other Subscription Costs, and Subscriptions.
    4. Click Apply Filters.

13. Click Save & Next. The Budget Amount screen appears.

14. Select the required option to define the budget amount for the rule. The options are:.

    1. Fixed Value: This option will enable the Budget Amount to be considered as budget and compared against the thresholds for monitoring and controlling.
       1. Specify the amount to be considered for budget control in the Enter Budget Amount field.
    2. Monthly Budget Planning (Set Budget): This option will allow the Budget Amount to be split on a monthly basis and considered for monitoring and controlling.
       1. Specify the amount to be considered for budget control in the Enter Budget Amount field.
       2. Specify a percent value in the Monthly Budget Growth % field, which will be used to define threshold limits for individual months from the budget amount.
       3. Click Auto Fill. The threshold limits for individual months will be calculated and autofilled based on the Monthly Budget Growth % value.
    3. Monthly Budget Planning (Auto Suggest): This option will enable CoreStack to suggest and auto-fill the threshold limits for each month based on the Budget Amount and analysis of cloud accounts.

15. Click Save & Next. The Alert Threshold & Actions screen appears.

In the Threshold & Actions screen, Threshold Actions can be configured for the budget rule. For each threshold action perform the following:

In the Set budget thresholds section:

16. Select required option to define the amount for the threshold action. The options are:
    1. Actual Cost: A fixed amount that can be configured and compared against the cost incurred by the resources on cloud during the current budget period.
    1. Specify the percent of budget amount that must be considered as Actual Cost in the % of Budgeted Amount field.
    2. The fixed amount will be calculated automatically using the % of Budgeted Amount value and displayed in the Amount field.
    2. Forecasted Cost: A forecasted amount (in percent) can be configured and compared against the potential cost that will be incurred at the end of the current budget period on cloud. The potential cost will be forecasted based on the actual cost that is incurred so far by the cloud resources.
    1. Specify the percent of budget amount that must be considered as Forecasted Cost in the % of Budgeted Amount field.

In the Set Budget Notifications section, notifications can be configured for the threshold action:

17. Specify a name for the notification settings in the Notification Settings Name field.
18. Specify the email addresses, which will be notified when the budget exceeds the threshold, in the Email Notifications field.
19. Click Add to include the specified email addresses in the notification settings.
20. Select required option from the Other Notifications dropdown list to include additional notification mechanisms, if required.
21. Click Add to include the selected additional notification mechanism in the notification settings.
22. Configure the settings required for the selected Other Notifications, as needed. The configuration is dependent on the option selected.
23. Click Save as template button, if required, to save and reuse the notification settings.
24. Click + Notification button to configure additional notification settings for the threshold action.

In the Set Budget Actions section, budget actions can be configured for the threshold action:

25. Specify a name for the budget action in the Budget Action Name field.

26. Select the required actions from the Action Type dropdown list that must be performed on cloud resources to control the cost within the budget when a certain threshold limit is reached. Additional fields will be displayed based on the action type selected.

27. Configure required details in the additional fields specific to the selected action.

28. Select Yes or No to specify if the action should be performed automatically.

29. Configure the notification settings required for the action. The progress and status of the action will be notified using these settings. The options are:

    1. Use existing notification settings: The notification settings already configured for the threshold action will be used.
    2. Use different notification settings: A new notification settings can be configured and used for the budget action.
    3. None: No notifications will be sent.

30. Click + Budget Action button to configure additional budget actions for the threshold action.

31. Click + New Alert to configure additional threshold actions for the rule.

Multiple threshold actions can be configured for a budget rule with different thresholds, notification and budget action settings. A maximum of 5 threshold actions can be configured for a budget rule.

32. Click Save & Next. The Review screen appears.
33. Click Edit icon to modify the details, if required.
34. Click Submit Budget.

A new budget rule will be created and listed in the Budget Management dashboard. CoreStack will start monitoring and controlling the cloud cost as configured in the budget rule and its related insights can be viewed from the Budget Management dashboard.

Viewing Insights for a Budget

For any of the budget rule listed in the Budget Management dashboard, relevant insights can be viewed. To view the insights for a budget rule:

1. Navigate to the Budget Management dashboard.
2. Click Eye icon next to the required budget rule. The View Budget screen appears.

The View Budget screen provides a detailed overview of the selected budget with the following sections/tabs:

• Overview: This section provides a dashboard view of the cost-related details of the budget rule such as budget amount, amount used, forecasted budget, etc.
• Budget Summary: This tab lists all the details related to the budget rule such as name, budget type, budget reset period, budget start date, budget scope, alerts, thresholds.
• Alerts: This tab lists all the alerts that are triggered for the budget rule with its details and associated actions.
• All Insights: This tab lists all the insights, with its details, for the budget rule.
• Budget History: This tab provides an overview of how the actual spend has performed in comparison to the budgeted amount.
• Budget Activity/Events: This tab provides a complete change log of all activities performed on the budget rule such as budget creation, budget modification, threshold alert triggered, actions performed.

Editing a Budget

The budget rules listed in the Budget Management dashboard can be modified, if required. The following steps need to be performed to edit a budget rule.

1. Navigate to the Budget Management dashboard.
2. Click Edit icon next to the required budget rule. The Edit Budget screen appears.
3. Modify the required fields as needed. The fields will be the same as explained in the Creating a New Budget section.
4. Once the changes are updated, click Submit Budget.

The budget rule will be updated with the changes.

Deleting a Budget

Any budget rule listed in the Budget Management dashboard can be deleted, if required. The following steps need to be performed to delete a budget rule.

1. Navigate to the Budget Management dashboard.
2. Click Delete icon next to the required budget rule. The _Alert _screen pops up.
3. Click Confirm button to complete the deletion of the budget rule.
   The budget rule will be deleted successfully.

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Note:

To know about differences in cost data between Budget and Posture pages, refer here.