Pricing FAQ: Azure Costs in Spotto
Spotto shows the cost data that Azure makes available for the subscription, then labels whether the value is billing-backed, estimated, or blended.
For normal billing-backed subscriptions, Spotto reads Azure billing and consumption data at the subscription or billing scope. That means Spotto should show the same cost values you can see in Azure Cost Management or the Azure billing portal for the same scope and period.
When Azure billing data is delayed, incomplete, or not available, Spotto may estimate recent or missing spend from observed usage, resource metrics, recent actual rates, and Azure retail pricing. Those estimates are useful for operational visibility, but Azure billing remains the source of truth. Finance teams already have enough spreadsheets; we do not need to make the source of truth mysterious too.
The fastest way to interpret a number is to check its source label:
- Billing means Spotto is showing Azure billing-backed cost.
- Estimated means Spotto calculated the value because final billing data was not available.
- Blended means the selected view contains both billing-backed and estimated spend.
Pricing terms
| Term | What it means in Spotto |
|---|---|
| Actual | Billing-backed cost from Azure Cost Management, Consumption APIs, or billing export data. This is the amount Azure reports for the scope and period Spotto can read, including discounts, negotiated rates, credits, and benefit effects when Azure exposes them. |
| Amortized | Azure billing-backed cost with reservation or savings-plan commitment costs spread across usage periods where Azure provides amortized data. |
| Retail | Azure list pricing from the Azure Retail Prices API. Retail pricing does not include customer-specific discounts unless Azure exposes a matching customer price through billing data. |
| Estimated from actual | Estimated spend calculated from recent billing-backed rates or observed actual usage patterns. This is usually preferred when billing history exists but the newest days have not landed yet. |
| Estimated from retail | Estimated spend calculated from Azure retail prices, resource shape, SKU, region, and metrics when actual billing rates are not available. |
| Blended | A period or resource contains both billing-backed and estimated spend. Spotto may show the billed and estimated portions separately where the UI supports it. |
What Spotto shows by subscription type
| Subscription or agreement type | What Spotto usually shows |
|---|---|
| Pay-as-you-go / direct | Actual Azure billing data when Cost Management or billing export access is available. Recent days may be estimated until Azure publishes the final usage. |
| Enterprise Agreement (EA) | Actual and amortized billing data when the Spotto identity has the required billing or Cost Management access. EA discounts are reflected when Azure exposes them in the readable billing data. |
| Microsoft Customer Agreement (MCA) | Actual and amortized billing data when the Spotto identity has the required subscription or billing-scope access. |
| Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) / Azure Plan | Actual customer-visible cost when the CSP partner has enabled customer Azure Usage visibility and Spotto has the required RBAC access. |
| MACC (Microsoft Azure Consumption Commitment) | Cost values are still read from Azure billing data. Spotto does not calculate MACC drawdown or eligibility separately; it reflects the costs and credits Azure exposes in the billing data Spotto can read. |
| Sponsorship / no-bill subscriptions | If Azure does not provide a readable bill, Spotto may estimate spend from usage, metrics, resource shape, and pricing data. These values are estimates, not invoices. |
Enterprise Agreement pricing visibility
For Enterprise Agreement subscriptions, Azure can withhold monetary cost data when Account owners can view charges (AO view charges) is disabled on the enrollment. Subscription RBAC does not override that billing policy.
If sync diagnostics show AccountCostDisabled, follow AccountCostDisabled: Enable EA Cost Access to enable charge visibility, verify the Spotto service principal's Azure roles, and rerun the subscription sync.
CSP pricing visibility
For CSP-managed subscriptions, Spotto can only read the pricing and cost data that Azure makes visible to the customer tenant or delegated identity.
If the CSP provider applies a discount and that discounted customer cost is visible in Azure Cost Management, Spotto should show the same value. If the partner has not enabled customer Azure Usage visibility, Azure may hide or deny the billing data even when normal subscription Reader access works.
Common symptoms include missing Cost Analysis, empty Cost Tree data, or sync diagnostics that mention billing visibility.
Use these pages when CSP billing data is missing:
- CspAzureUsageVisibility: Fix Azure Billing Access
- SubscriptionCostDisabled: Fix Azure Cost Access
- AccountCostDisabled: Enable EA Cost Access
- Azure Cloud Account Permissions
GDAP status
GDAP support for durable delegated partner access is available in beta for MSP and customer companies where the feature has been enabled. An MSP admin first authorizes a reusable partner profile in the Spotto root company, then connects and validates a separate GDAP cloud account inside each customer company.
Do not treat GDAP by itself as the fix for missing pricing. Spotto still needs Azure billing visibility and the right cost permissions for the subscription or billing scope. What Spotto can display depends on what Azure allows the delegated identity to read, and GDAP billing export setup is not currently supported.
Why recent spend can be estimated
Azure billing data is not real-time. It can take hours or days before usage appears in Cost Management, billing APIs, or exports.
During that gap, Spotto may estimate current-period cost if the resource is still running and there is enough usage, metric, SKU, region, or pricing evidence to calculate a reasonable value.
This is why you may see:
- Billing for days where Azure billing data has landed.
- Estimated for days where Spotto has usage or metric evidence but Azure has not published billing detail yet.
- Blended when a selected period contains both billing-backed and estimated rows.
For month-end reporting, wait until Azure billing data has settled and check the final billing-backed view.
Sponsorship and no-bill subscriptions
Some subscriptions do not expose a normal bill in Azure Cost Management. Sponsorship subscriptions are the common example.
When there is no bill, or the bill is not available to Spotto, Spotto can still estimate spend where enough supporting data exists. Depending on the service, that can include:
- the resources that exist
- the services and SKUs in use
- Azure Monitor metrics where available
- usage details, where Azure provides them
- Azure retail pricing
- recent actual rates if any billing-backed data exists
These estimates help you understand run rate and cost risk. They are not a replacement for an Azure invoice.
Retail versus actual
Retail pricing is useful when Spotto needs a public list-price basis for estimation, comparison, or optimization. Actual pricing is better when Azure has already provided customer-specific billing rows.
In practice:
- Spotto prefers actual billing data when it is available.
- Spotto uses actual and amortized data for commitment-aware reporting where Azure provides both.
- Spotto uses retail pricing when actual rates are missing or when comparing against list-price alternatives.
- Spotto may use recent actual rates to estimate a current billing gap before falling back to retail pricing.
If your organization has negotiated rates, credits, MACC effects, or partner discounts, those should appear in Spotto only when Azure exposes them through billing data that Spotto can read.
Reservations and Savings Plans
Reservation and Savings Plan information comes from Azure billing, consumption, reservation, savings-plan, or billing export data, depending on the workflow and permissions available.
Spotto uses this data to show:
- actual and amortized cost
- commitment coverage
- utilization
- expiry and renewal context
- savings opportunities
- resource-level benefit coverage where available
If commitment data is missing, check the Azure permission requirements for Reservations Reader, Reservations Contributor, and Savings plan Reader in Azure Cloud Account Permissions.
Troubleshooting
Costs are missing for a CSP subscription
What you're seeing: Cost Analysis, Cost Tree, dashboard spend widgets, or resource cost overlays are empty.
Likely causes:
- The CSP partner has not enabled customer Azure Usage visibility.
- Spotto has Reader access but not Cost Management Reader.
- The subscription is not in a supported Azure Plan or MCA visibility model.
How to fix:
- Ask the CSP partner to enable Azure Usage or Azure Usage charges for the customer.
- Confirm the Spotto service principal has Reader and Cost Management Reader.
- Rerun sync in Spotto.
- Use CspAzureUsageVisibility: Fix Azure Billing Access if the warning remains.
Recent days look estimated
What you're seeing: A current period shows Estimated or Blended instead of fully billing-backed cost.
Likely causes:
- Azure has not published billing rows for the newest usage yet.
- The resource is active, so Spotto is estimating the billing gap.
How to fix:
- Use the estimate for early investigation.
- Recheck after the next billing sync.
- Use the billing-backed value for final month-end reporting.
Actual cost does not match retail pricing
What you're seeing: Spotto shows a billed unit price or total that differs from Azure retail pricing.
Likely causes:
- The subscription has a negotiated rate, CSP discount, EA price, credit, or commitment effect.
- Spotto is showing actual billing data, not list price.
How to fix:
- Check whether the value is labeled Billing, Estimated, or Blended in Spotto.
- Compare the same subscription, scope, currency, and period in Azure Cost Management.
- If the value is labeled Billing and Azure shows the same number, Azure billing is the source of truth.
- If the value is labeled Estimated, wait for billing data to settle before using it for final reporting.