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New commerce experience in Cloud Solution Providers program (CSP) Azure plan billing

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Appropriate roles: Admin agent | Billing admin

This article shows you how to access and understand your invoice and reconciliation data for Azure plan billing. Azure plan billing is easy, with one billing date and calendar-monthly billing period.

Access your invoices and reconciliation files

The billing admin for your company receives an email when the invoice is ready.

To access the new commerce invoices and reconciliation files, follow these steps:

  1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Billing workspace.

  2. Go to the Billing overview (NCE) task menu > Billing | Billing Overview (NCE) page and choose the year at the upper right corner > select the invoice number > find the reconciliation file on the side panel > select Download report.

Azure resource management

  • Azure plan: An Azure plan serves as the top-level container for all usage. Every usage is linked to an Azure plan.
  • Azure subscription: Within an Azure plan, you can find one or more Azure subscriptions. Use these subscriptions to manage and deploy your resources efficiently.
  • Resource group: To organize resources within a subscription, use resource groups. Assign a resource to a specific resource group.
  • Resource: Examples of resources include virtual machines and storage accounts, which are crucial elements of your infrastructure.
  • Meter: Meters track your resource usage. Different meters measure different aspects of resource consumption. Each meter has a unique Meter ID.

By understanding and utilizing these components, you can manage your Azure resources more effectively and ensure optimal usage.

Hierarchy of subscription resource groups and metering

Azure plan:

  • Subscription A

    • ResourceGroup 1

      • Virtual machine (resource)
        • Compute meter
      • Virtual network (resource)
        • No billing meter

    • ResourceGroup 2

      • Virtual machine (resource)
        • Compute meter
      • Premium SSD-managed disk (resource)
        • Storage capacity meter
        • Storage operations meter

  • Subscription B

    • ResourceGroup 1

      • Azure SQL (resource)
        • Compute meter
      • VPN Gateway (resource)
        • VPN gateway meter

    • ResourceGroup 2

      • Virtual Network Interface (resource)
        • No billing meter

About your invoice

Review the following numbers on the image regarding your invoice:

  1. Availability: Your invoice is ready by the eighth of each month.
  2. Payment terms: Payments are due within 60 days from invoice date.
  3. Billing period: The billing period covers a full calendar month, such as June 1 to June 30.
  4. Net charges: All charges are adjusted for partner earned credits.
  5. Detailed information: For more specifics, check invoice reconciliation and the daily rated usage data.

We appreciate your attention to these details and are here to assist if you have any questions.

Microsoft invoice example.

Invoice reconciliation

  • The invoice reconciliation line items show discounts or credits for each meter in the billing period. For example, a meter might have a tiered discount, or a partner earned credit (PEC). The PriceAdjustmentDescription describes the discount and the EffectiveUnitPrice shows the price after adjusting discounts.

  • The effective unit price for a resource equals the unit price without discounts or partner earned credits when the pricing and billing currency is the same.

How to find tiered pricing in the reconciliation line items

Find out how to match tier prices in your invoice reconciliation data.

Read the daily usage file

  • Azure plan meters every day calculates the subscription charges.

  • Partner earned credit applies to the eligible resources or subscriptions daily.

  • Subscription meter show line item for each day's usage if there's any usage in that month.

  • In the following image:

    • Meter qualified for Partner earned credit for services managed from 7/1 - 7/3 (Note the effective unit price is the retail price less partner earned credit.

    • Meter didn't qualify for Partner earned credit for services managed from 7/4 - 7/7 (Note the effective unit price is the retail price).

    • Meter qualified for Partner earned credit for services managed from 7/8 - 7/31 (Note the effective unit price is the retail price less partner earned credit).

    Reconciliation file example.

Azure reservations

You can buy Azure reservations under an Azure plan and pay once or monthly.

Azure savings plans

You can buy Azure savings plans under an Azure plan and pay once or monthly. Learn how to reconcile Azure savings plans.

How do you calculate the costs of a product that has both a fixed fee and pay-as-you-go charges?

To learn how we calculate costs for a product or subscription with both fixed and variable charges, see cost calculation.

What unit price do we use to calculate the cost of Azure reservations or savings plans?

You pay for Azure reservations or savings plans in your billing currency. We convert the USD price to your billing currency with the exchange rate of the billing month. The reconciliation line item shows the exchange rate.

Effective unit price calculation for Azure plan pay-as-you-go charges

To ensure you get the best value, we calculate the effective unit price at the meter level based on your usage. Here's how we calculate it:

  • Daily usage: We track your usage every day throughout the billing period.
  • Billable cost: The cost that each meter calculates for a resource.
  • Tier pricing: If applicable, we factor in any tier pricing.
  • Partner earned credit: If applicable, we include any partner earned credits.

The effective unit price might change daily based on your usage patterns and is finalized at the end of the billing period.

We encourage you to monitor your usage regularly to maximize your savings. With this approach, you have better control over your expenses and can make informed decisions about your Azure services.

Find out whether your meter uses tiered pricing

If you don't know whether your meter uses tiered pricing, follow the steps to find out.

  1. Sign in to Partner Center and select the Pricing workspace.

  2. Select Azure plan pricing.

  3. Find your meter by ID, and then download the pricing data.

Sample calculation

Here's how to find the effective unit price in the open billing period.

The table uses these values:

  • UP = Unit price of the resource/hour = 0.868

  • BUU = Billable usage unit for the meter

  • BC = Billable cost for the meter = BUU * UP * 0.85, which accounts for the 15% PEC. To charge the minimum amount, we round the value down to two decimal places.

  • Effective unit price = BUU/BC

Note

The meter in this example doesn't have any tier pricing or discounts.

Date BUU (Billable usage unit) BC (Billable cost) Effective unit price
3-Aug 29 21.39 0.737586206896552
10-Aug 210.950039 155.63 0.737757626107858
25-Aug 555.950039 410.17 0.737782122900436

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