Group budget monitoring

Introduction

Establishing a budget at the cost management group level triggers alerts when actual costs vary from the specified budget threshold.

Budget configuration

1. Navigate to the desired cost management group -> Monitoring and click Configure in the Group budget widget.
2. Enable monitoring toggle, select the time interval, choose the cost metric type, and define the budget value.

3. Click Next, configure the required escalation policy and notification channels, then click Save.

Trends will be generated based on the configured interval and budget threshold, with the red dotted lines representing the set budget.

Explain with AI

Explain with AI generates a Budget Insights report for the group, summarizing the current budget configuration, spend trend, threshold health, and improvement recommendations in a single view.

1. Navigate to the desired cost management group → Monitoring.
2. Click the Explain with AI ( ✦ ) icon in the Group budget widget header.

The Budget Insights report opens and includes:

• Configuration — a summary of the active monitoring settings: interval, cost metric, budget value, thresholds, escalation policy, and notification channels.
• How this budget works — a plain-language explanation of how the budget and thresholds interact for the current configuration.
• Spend trend & budget fit — a spend vs budget chart for the recent period, with the budget shown as a reference line.
• Threshold health — a visual indicator of how current spend sits relative to each configured threshold.
• Right-sizing your budget — recommendations to tighten or adjust the budget value based on recent spend patterns.
• Alert history — total, currently open, and resolved alerts for the last 30 days.
• Ways to improve — actionable suggestions such as adding a pre-breach threshold or aligning the budget more closely with current spend.

Extended monitoring capabilities

In addition to the standard group budget monitoring, the configuration includes several advanced features that enhance budget tracking efficiency and provide greater flexibility in managing, visualizing, and analyzing budget data.

1. Budget Monitoring Using Percentage Thresholds

Users can configure percentage-based thresholds to receive notifications as budget consumption approaches defined limits. This enables early detection and proactive management of budget utilization.

To configure alert thresholds:

1. Configure a budget value in the Group budget configuration.
2. Go to the Alert Configuration section within the Group Budget configuration.
3. Under Alert conditions, enter one or more percentage thresholds at which alerts should be triggered when budget usage exceeds the specified limits.
4. Click Apply
5. Click Next -> Save in the Group budget configuration.

Alerts are generated when budget consumption surpasses each defined percentage threshold of the allocated budget.

2. Budget risk prediction

Budget risk prediction for monthly budgets proactively identifies the risk of budget overrun by evaluating recent spending behavior over a user-specified timeframe, and generates alerts based on the predicted exceedance date.

Financial risks are mitigated by analyzing spending trends and issuing early warnings when budget threshold is projected to be exceeded.

To configure budget risk prediction:

1. In the Group budget configuration, set the Interval to Monthly and configure a budget value.

2. Go to the Alert Configuration section under the Group Budget Monitoring settings.
3. Define the number of days to be used for calculating the prediction based on the current spending rate.
   
4. Click Apply
5. Click Next -> Save in the Group budget configuration.

A sample email alert generated for budget risk prediction is provided below:

Manage existing configuration

1. Navigate to the Monitoring section of the Cost group where the Group budget is configured.
2. In the Group budget widget, click Manage.
3. Update the required settings.
4. Click Save to apply the changes.

Updating percentage thresholds or Budget risk prediction settings does not require saving the entire Group budget configuration. Select Apply within the Alert Conditions section and simply exit the configuration widget.

Enable/Disable Group budget monitoring

Group budget monitoring can be Enabled/Disabled by selecting the Toggle on/Toggle off button available in the Group budget wizard.

Group budget report

The image below illustrates the Group budget alert received for a cost group, indicating that the actual expenses have exceeded the predefined budget limit.

Determining monitoring status of a cost group

The monitoring status of a cost management group in the tree view is determined by the state of the Group budget defined, following this sequence:

• Red: Indicates that 100% of the budget threshold is reached.
• Green: Indicates that the group budget is less than the configured budget or its percentage thresholds.
• Grey: Indicates that no budget monitoring is enabled for the group.

Alert incidents

• Budget monitoring alerts will be recorded as incidents and are accessible using the View Incidents option located in the Group budget widget.

• The incident details can be accessed by clicking the open status.

• Alert incidents for group budgets surpassing the 100% limit will be marked as open, indicating an error state for the cost group in the tree view, while those exceeding other percentage limits will be closed.