Azure Cost Management Reviews

I mainly use it for insights. It's about managing the cost of our resources and how to optimize where we can downsize or right-size resources.

It's mostly about analytics, and this is the first use case. Technically, there are multiple projects, like data integration, data cleansing, and maintaining data quality. There are a few of the underlying use cases. But the topmost or very first use case is analytics.

We have a dedicated cost management team to optimize costs.

Management would be difficult because right now I'm having one of the projects. And for that project, we are consuming multiple other services. There are storage, pipelines, multiple data functions, and Azure functions. So, the solution is made above multiple Azure components. And there are multiple environments. Like the development environment, the staging, and the production environment. 

Even in production, we have beta and alpha. So it's too much of resources, and it's difficult to manually go through each and every resource every time and try to see where we are hitting the cost and where we can reduce the cost. So that's where the cost management comes in to achieve.

Azure Cost Management actually helps an organization primarily for cost forecasting. For example, I have a budget in mind for this year. Azure Cost Management includes a feature called resource forecasting. Based on current resource usage and projected demand (including any buffer you add for your projects), you can estimate your expected costs for next year. This information helps you build budgets for future periods. So, budgeting tools are very helpful in this regard.

Before we formally adopted Cost Management, based on current consumption, we estimated costs for development and user acceptance testing. These estimates were surprisingly accurate, around 90%. Without a tool like this, manual forecasting could lead to missed savings or even overspending.

There are many features in Azure Cost Management that are most effective in tracking and reducing cloud costs. The resource forecasting feature is invaluable. Secondly, the ability to drill down to the regional and resource level is incredibly helpful for pinpointing where my costs are accruing. 

Improved integration with other solutions could definitely be beneficial.

I have been using it for more than five years now. 

I would rate the stability a seven out of ten. 

There are around a thousand end users using this solution in my organization. 

I would rate the scalability a six out of ten. We have limited features. So, I have neutral views on scalability. 

So, my feedback for customer service and support isn't specific to Cost Management, but for other resources like Power BI and Azure App Services, support can be slow. In some cases, I expect a quick turnaround. 

We might need to repeat information when switching agents. So, this can be a continuous cycle. I spend extra time explaining things on each call. So, there's room for improvement.

Neutral

We use AWS and some Google Cloud servers.

The vendor handles maintenance and troubleshooting.

My team has twelve members who handle things like advertisement, deployment, and cloud resource management.

However, there are different teams and people as it varies from project to project. 

Compared to competitors, it's cost-effective. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with ten being expensive. 

Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten. I would recommend using this product to others. 

We use Azure Cost Management to minimize cloud costs.

I like the fact that you can set alerts on the predicted cost in Azure Cost Management. Before the cost reaches a limit, you can send out a warning that costs are predicted to exceed a threshold.

The solution's technical support should be faster, more knowledgeable, and customer-friendly.

I have been using Azure Cost Management for five years.

I’ve never had any issues with the solution’s stability.

I rate Azure Cost Management ten out of ten for stability.

Azure Cost Management is a scalable solution. More than 30 customers are using the solution in our organization.

I have had pretty bad experiences with the solution's technical support.

The solution's initial setup was quite easy because it was enabled by default.

A small team of five people is needed to deploy and maintain the solution.

With Azure Cost Management, companies can detect and address unexpected cloud expenditures.

Azure Cost Management is a free cost management tool.

Before choosing Azure Cost Management, we evaluated CloudCheckr and CloudHealth. The main difference between them and Azure Cost Management is multi-cloud support.

Azure Cost Management is a cloud-based solution.

I would recommend Azure Cost Management to other users because it's a free cost management tool you can use rather than buy a third-party tool. Azure Cost Management is available out of the box and does what it's supposed to be doing. Some third-party tools have more capabilities, but you don't really need those.

Overall, I rate Azure Cost Management an eight out of ten.

I use Azure Cost Management mostly for customer demos and internal use. Our monthly cost is about 4000-5000 dollars.

The interface is good and user-friendly, allowing us to manage it proactively and efficiently. We use the budgeting and forecasting functions for financial planning, which work fine.

I'd like to see improvements in tracking billing and costs. It would be helpful to have alerts generated by instance and location. We use the cloud for multiple programs, and it's difficult to segregate costs and get budgets from customers. We have to tag each instance, which is time-consuming. Automation and proactive alerts by instance or instance IDs would be beneficial.

I think some automation can be done to make the interface more user-friendly. We need holistic retail features about the cost. For example, if we have an overall expense of 20,000 dollars for August, we get a critical breakdown by instance size and service size. But this comes in a common pool, as general data, not specific to each instance. We've configured resources and add-on services tagged to instances, but there should be a mechanism to download these details when someone needs them automatically.

Sometimes, customers ask about their exact usage out of the total cost, and it's difficult to convince them. We don't have such a mechanism available in the interface. We have to manually do it in Excel and get it approved by them. These are the main points I'd like to see improved. It would be much easier if we could get instance-specific breakdowns automatically rather than having to compile this information manually.

I have been using the product for three years. 

I rate the product's stability a nine out of ten. 

I rate the tool's scalability an eight out of ten. 

I have used AWS Cost Explorer but find the product to be more fast. 

The initial setup is simple but needs to be more accurate and have better data security. I've been managing it for two years and still struggle with the manual work.

I rate the tool's pricing a six out of ten - the price could be lower.

Overall, I'd rate Azure Cost Management eight out of ten. We recommend it to our clients and customers.

We primarily use Azure Cost Management to oversee the costs for customers and to manage the managed service.

The solution helps us ensure that every customer has projects they can work with monthly. We use it to ensure that the services they consume don't exceed what they can afford to pay each month.

Also, it has predictive analysis. It can forecast based on the costs associated with the particular architecture and how often they use it, estimating how much they'll spend. It streamlines the process instead of calculating manually.

You can quickly access the platform based on our organization's setup and start monitoring and optimizing costs for every customer since the exchange rate is quite high. It help customers stay within budget and manage their annual budgets. Whatever they decide to spend for that year on a particular service, it ensure it doesn't exceed. It assist in managing costs to maintain their loyalty.

Once a customer reaches a certain threshold, the tool inform them about the costs, letting them know they're about to exceed their threshold and offer options to either reduce consumption.

The response time of customer support can be improved.

I have been using Azure Cost Management for 3 months.

The product is stable.

I rate the solution's stability a 7 out of 10.

The solution’s scalability is good.

20-30 users are using this solution.

I rate the solution's scalability a 7 out of 10.

Customer support is helpful.

Neutral

We have used Rapid7 before.

There are 30 engineers for the solution's deployment and maintenance in our organization. 

 Overall, I rate the solution a seven out of ten.

Basically, they provide licenses to customers who already have an Azure subscription. They send these licenses to customers based on their needs, either extracting them from the partner center or group management or then delivering them, often through email. Additionally, for the Dental Connection system, APIs support the automated delivery of licenses to customers. On another note, when addressing billing concerns, there are instances where customers claim they've been overcharged by varying amounts, such as a hundred, five hundred, or even a thousand dollars. In such cases, they examine cost management to investigate these charges.

There are significant issues with Power BI integration at the moment, particularly with built-in applications for course management. Multiple features don't allow for efficient report generation. This is one primary concern. The second issue relates to reporting, even when using Power BI templates for course management. There are problems with data import that require manual entry. So, these are the two main challenges I'm currently facing.

Another matter to consider is the removal of the markup option for partners. I'm not sure if it will be added back, but it used to allow marking up Azure usage for enterprise customers. I'm uncertain if there's an alternative way to achieve the same function. Partners need to mark up services when selling to customers, and it's currently unavailable for some products or services.

I have been working with Azure Cost Management for quite sometime. 

The stability is 10 out of 10.

Scalability is not needed.

Technical support is lacking in terms of response time and effectiveness. The response times are quite lengthy, and the support team's ability to address complex issues is questionable. While they may be suitable for straightforward problems, when it comes to more intricate issues, the support often falls short of expectations. This applies across various support levels, including Microsoft Premier, unified support, basic, and standard.

We solely utilize Azure Cost Management for overseeing our Azure services, so we haven't explored any competing solutions.

No custom setup is required for most cases. The only situation where setup may be needed is when working with a Microsoft CSV partner and running automation. In such cases, some configurations may be necessary.

Furthermore, deploying this to Azure Management Services is a straightforward process. It's a built-in feature or service within Azure, so there's no need to go through a separate deployment process. It's readily available with every subscription.

Pricing isn't applicable as it's included with the subscription. It depends on the services used. If you acquire any services on Azure, you pay for the subscription, and the billing or cost management is included for free.

Overall, I would rate it 9 out of 10. 

We use the product for cost analysis. 

The tool helps with budgeting and reporting. It notifies us whenever we cross the threshold.

Azure Cost Management needs to improve scalability. 

I have been using the product for two years. 

I rate Azure Cost Management's stability a ten out of ten. 

I rate the solution's scalability a ten out of ten. My company has 10-20 users. 

Microsoft's support is helpful. 

Positive

Azure Cost Management is a cloud solution and doesn't require installation. 

Azure Cost Management comes as a part of other solutions. You need to pay as per your requirement based on the pay-as-you-go model. 

I rate the solution a nine out of ten. 

We use the solution for comparing different service providers and providing business insights into the likely costs associated with their solutions. This includes conducting cost-benefit analysis, evaluating ROI, managing databases, and more.

The solution gives visibility into the cost of cloud-based solutions.

Azure Cost Management provides predictability of the cost of Azure solutions, which is precisely what businesses are seeking when we propose any cloud-based solutions to them.

Support could be improved.

I have been using Azure Cost Management for two years.

The product is stable.

I rate the solution’s stability a ten out of ten.

The solution is scalable.

I rate the solution's scalability a ten out of ten.

We are pretty happy with the support, even though it could be improved.

Positive

I have used AWS before.

The solution setup is done online.

The product comes free. There is no cost associated with the product.

The solution has automatic maintenance.

Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

We use the solution to identify the cost management and the advisor cost savings plans.

The solution is helping to identify underutilized virtual machines for possible right sizing and for reservation purchases or savings plans purchases.

The cost analysis and exportability are the most valuable features of the solution.

I would like to have added to Azure Cost Management, drill down features from within the cost analysis reporting.

I have been using the solution for six months.

The stability is good.

The solution's scalability is good. I have had no issues.

We see a return on investment with the solution.

I give the solution's overall cost an eight out of ten.

I give the solution an eight out of ten.

We currently have around 30 people using the solution and we have plans to increase that usage.

I advice new users to take the training courses before using Azure Cost Management.