support plan costing

Question

HI team, I have a 1000$ credit points but still when I changed my support plan to basic to developer plan it charged it from card directly, is it the process or can I apply for refund ?

Answer 1

Hello Hari Vinod

Thank you for reaching out.

I understand the concern regarding being charged on your credit card even though you have available Azure credits. This behavior is expected and by design.

Azure credits (including $1000 credits, sponsorship credits, or startup credits) do not apply to Azure support plans. Support plans are billed separately from Azure service consumption.

• Azure credits only cover eligible Azure services usage (compute, storage, networking, etc.).
• A credit card is required to cover services that are not included in the credits, such as support plans.

Additionally, the support plan itself:

• The Developer support plan is a paid plan ($29/month) and is billed independently of usage.

Because of this, when you upgraded from Basic (free) to Developer, the charge was applied directly to your payment method instead of deducting from credits.

• Azure support plans are billed monthly and automatically renewed.
• If you cancel the plan, billing continues for the current billing period, and prorated refunds are not guaranteed.

However, if this upgrade was accidental, you can still:

Raise a billing support request to request a refund review (Billing support is free even on Basic plan)

Steps:

1. Go to Azure Portal → Help + Support
2. Click Create a support request
3. Select Billing as the issue type
4. Submit details explaining that the upgrade was unintended

Official guidance to contact billing support:

• https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-portal/supportability/how-to-create-azure-support-request

1. If not needed, cancel the Developer support plan to avoid future charges
   • Go to Cost Management + Billing → Support plans → Cancel Reference: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cost-management-billing/manage/cancel-azure-subscription
2. Submit a billing support request to request a refund review.

Thanks,

Suchitra.

Answer 2

Changing the Azure support plan from Basic to Developer is billed separately and is not covered by startup credits. The $1,000 startup credit offer includes a Basic support plan for the Azure Sponsorship subscription; upgrading to Developer support is a paid plan and is charged to the payment method on file.

For billing and refund questions related to Azure startup credits and support plans, use Azure support via the Azure portal. The included Basic support plan provides billing and subscription management support at no extra cost, so a billing support request can be opened to ask whether the Developer support charge is refundable in this specific case.

Steps:

1. Sign in to the Azure portal with the subscription that has the startup credits.
2. Go to Help + support.
3. Create a new support request and choose Billing as the issue type.
4. Provide details of the support plan change and the charge to request a review/refund.

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References:

• Startup support and troubleshooting