Exercise - Create budget and alerts

This guided project consists of the following exercises:

• Apply cost-tracking tags
• Create budget and alerts
• Assign and test Azure Policy

In this exercise, you create a budget with alert thresholds that notify you before spending exceeds your target. Budget alerts give you early warning so you can investigate and adjust before costs get out of control.

This exercise includes the following tasks:

• Open Cost Management and start the budget
• Configure and create the budget

Outcome: Budget thresholds configured with actionable notifications.

Task 1: Open Cost Management and start the budget

Navigate to the Cost Management service where you define spend limits and alerts. This is the central place to monitor and control cloud spending across your subscription and resources.

1. In the portal search bar, search for Cost Management + Billing and select Cost Management + Billing.
2. In the left menu, select Budgets.
3. Select + Add.
4. Choose a scope you can manage. If resource-group-level budgets are available in your environment, use rg-gp-cost-guardrails. Otherwise use the subscription scope and note the broader scope in your validation notes.

Task 2: Configure and create the budget

Set up your budget parameters including amount, reset period, and alert thresholds. These alerts will notify you before you overspend, giving you time to investigate and adjust.

1. For Name, enter gp-pilot-budget.
2. For Reset period, select Monthly.
3. For Amount, enter a small test value such as 10 (USD or your billing currency).
4. Select Next to move to the alerts section.
5. Select + Add to add an alert condition.
6. For Type, select Actual.
7. For the threshold, enter 80 percent.
8. In the Alert recipients field, enter your email address.
9. Select + Add to add a second alert condition.
10. For Type, select Actual.
11. For the threshold, enter 100 percent.
12. In the Alert recipients field, enter the same email address.
13. Select Create.