Edge Security Acceleration:Why am I still charged for resources after I purchase resource plans?

Troubleshooting

Possible causes and solutions

After you purchase resource plans, you may still be charged for resources due to the following causes.

• Possible cause 1: Some billable items are not covered by the resource plans that you purchased

  The billing structure of DCDN consists of basic services and value-added services. After you activate DCDN, you may be charged for multiple billable items such as traffic and requests. Each type of resource plan can offset only specific types of resource fees. For example, you cannot use outbound traffic plans to offset the fees of HTTP requests for static content. In this case, the fees are deducted from your account balance. If your account balance is insufficient, overdue payments may be generated.

  Note

  • For information about billable items, see Billing overview.

  • For more information about resource plan billing, see Introduction to resource plans.

  Solution

  Check your bills to confirm whether all billable items are covered by your resource plans. If a billable item is not covered, the fees are deducted from your account balance. If your account balance is insufficient, overdue payments may be generated.

  You can check whether value-added services, such as HTTPS and real-time logs, are enabled. By default, you are charged for value-added services on a pay-as-you-go basis. The fees are deducted from your account balance. You can also purchase resource plans for value-added services. For more information, see Billing of value-added services.

• Possible cause 2: The service location of the resource plan is different from the region where fees are generated

  DCDN resource plans usually have regional restrictions. A resource plan for one region can offset only billable items generated in that region. For example, if you purchase an outbound data transfer plan for the DCDN acceleration region of Chinese mainland (General), it can offset only billable items generated in that acceleration region. It cannot offset corresponding billable items in Hong Kong (China), Macao (China), Taiwan (China), or regions outside China.

  Solution

  If multiple locations are set for your domain, we recommend that you purchase resource plans for each of the locations so that resource fees in these locations can be offset. To purchase a resource plan, go to the resource plan buy page.

• Possible cause 3: The metering method you selected is not covered by the resource plans that you purchased

  Outbound data transfer plans support only the pay-by-data-transfer metering method. If you select the pay-by-bandwidth or pay-by-95th-percentile metering method, outbound data transfer plans are not applicable. In this case, payments or overdue payments are generated.

  Solution

  Change the metering method in the DCDN console by referring to Change the metering method.

• Possible cause 4: The amount of consumed resources has exceeded the quota of the resource plan

  After you purchase a resource plan, the amount of consumed resources that exceed the quota of the plan is automatically billed on a pay-as-you-go basis. For example, you purchased an outbound data transfer plan of 100 GB and the amount of outbound data transfer in the month is 110 GB. In this case, you are billed for the excess 10 GB on a pay-as-you-go basis. If your account balance is insufficient to settle the payment, an overdue payment is generated.

  Solution

  • Purchase additional resource plans: You can purchase additional resource plans to offset resource fees and prevent overdue payments. However, you cannot use resource plans to offset the fees of resources that are consumed before the resource plans are purchased.

  Note

  For more information, see Query the details of resource plans.

• Possible cause 5: Bills are delayed

  A resource plan takes effect immediately after you complete the payment. However, it takes 3 to 4 hours for DCDN to issue a bill after a billing cycle ends. For example, a bill you receive at 10:00 AM might cover your usage from 6:00 AM to 7:00 AM on the same day.

  Solution

  After you receive a bill, check the time at which the fees are incurred.

View the usage details of a resource plan

The usage details of a resource plan are essential for its management. You can view the following information: the pay-as-you-go instance associated with the resource plan, the billable item, the offset time, the offset amount, and the offset factor. By analyzing the usage details of a resource plan, you can check the usage of the associated pay-as-you-go instance in its bills.

1. Log on to the Expenses and Costs console.

2. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Billing Account > Resource Packages.

3. Set the Resource Type parameter to Resource Packages. Click the Details tab.

4. Configure the Start Time of Deducted Instance, Resource Plan ID and Deducted Instance ID parameters and click Search. The following table describes the parameters.

   Parameter	Description
   Resource Purchase Account	The account used to purchase the resource plan.
   Product Name	The name of the Alibaba Cloud product that is associated with the resource plan.
   Commodity Name	The name of the resource plan. Examples: Reserved Instance, Storage Capacity Unit, PolarDB Compute Plan, and ApsaraVideo Live Data Transfer Plan.
   Resource Plan Type	The category of the resource plan. Examples: Regional Reserved Instance, Compute Plan, and Reserved Space.
   Resource Plan ID	The ID of the resource plan.
   Commitment Cycle	The cycle based on which the quota of the resource plan is updated. Valid values: No Cycle, Hour, Day, Month, Calendar Month, and Dynamic Month. No Cycle: The fees of actual resource usage are deducted until the balance is used up or until the plan expires. Hour: A fixed hourly quota is provided. The unused quota of an hour does not roll over to the next hour. Day: A fixed daily quota is provided. The unused quota of a day does not roll over to the next day. Monthly: free trial edition. A fixed monthly quota is provided on the first day of each month. If you activate the service after 00:00 on the 1st of a month, the first and last months of the subscription period share the quota for one month. The unused quota of a month other than the two months does not roll over to the next month. Calendar Month: A fixed monthly quota is provided on the first day of each month. The unused quota of a month does not roll over to the next month. Dynamic Month: A fixed monthly quota is provided at 00:00 on the next day of the subscription date each month. The unused quota of a month does not roll over to the next month.
   Deduct Time	The time at which the resource plan offsets the usage fees of pay-as-you-go cloud resources.
   Before Deduct Capacity	The initial quota of the resource plan prior to the offset.
   Deducted Capacity	The amount of resource plan quota that is used to offset the usage fees of pay-as-you-go resources.
   Post Deduct Capacity	The remaining quota of the resource plan after the offset.
   Deducted Resource Owner Account	The account that owns the cloud resources whose fees are offset by using the resource plan.
   Deducted Commodity	The pay-as-you-go product associated with the cloud resources whose fees are offset by using the resource plan.
   Deducted Instance ID	The ID of the cloud resource whose fees are offset by using the resource plan.
   Deducted Billable Item	The billable item of the cloud resource whose fees are offset by using the resource plan, such as the usage of instances and system disks.
   Original Usage of Instance	The actual usage of the cloud resource whose fees are offset by using the resource plan. An offset factor is used. Therefore, the actual usage of a cloud resource may be different from the usage that is offset by using the resource plan.
   Deduct coefficient	The ratio applied when the resource plan offsets the usage fees of cloud resources. For example, each GiB of Photo and Drive Service (PDS) storage space consumes 0.13 GiB of a storage capacity unit (SCU). The offset factor that is applied when you use SCUs to offset PDS storage fees is 0.13.
   Start Time of Deducted Instance	The start time of the billing period for the cloud resource whose fees are offset by using the resource plan.
   End Time of Deducted Instance	The end time of the billing period for the cloud resource whose fees are offset by using the resource plan.
   Resource Plan Owner Account	The account that owns the resource plan.