Use tags to manage cost allocation - Resource Management

Tag your Alibaba Cloud resources by cost center, department, and project, and then use Cost Analysis to break down bills for cost allocation.

Background information

After you add or update tags, cost data may take up to 24 hours to appear in Cost Analysis.
Tags are available for the services listed in Supported cloud services.

Plan your tags by dimension—cost center, department, and project—following the Tagging best practices. The following table shows an example.

Business dimension	Tag (`tag key:tag value`)
cost center	`costcenter:Beijing` `costcenter:Shanghai` `costcenter:Hangzhou`
department	`department:Dev` `department:Test` `department:Ops`
project	`project:project A` `project:project B`

Create tags and add them to your resources.

Log on to the Resource Management console.
In the navigation pane on the left, choose Tag > Tag, and then click Create Tag.
In the Create Tag dialog box, create a tag.

Create the tags you planned in Step 1: Plan your tags.
Click Add Tags to Resources, select the resources that you want to tag, and then click Add Tag.

For example, add the tags costcenter:Beijing, department:Dev, and project:project A to resources used by the Beijing development team on Project A.

Note

To add tags in bulk, use CloudOps Orchestration Service (OOS). Use OOS to add tags to multiple ECS instances in bulk.
You can also add tags from each supported service's console.
You can also add tags by calling the Tag API. Create and add tags to a cloud resource.

Set the tags you created as cost allocation tags.

In the Expenses and Costs console, go to the Cost Allocation Tags page.
On the Cost Allocation Tag page, read the description and click Next.
Select the tags that you added in Step 2: Create and add tags to resources, specify them as cost allocation tags, and then click Next.
Click Enable.

In the Expenses and Costs console, go to the Cost Allocation Tags page.
On the Cost Allocation Tag page, find the tag that you added in Step 2: Create and add tags to resources and click Enable in the Actions column.

Analyze your costs based on the cost allocation tags.

In the Expenses and Costs console, go to the Cost Analysis page. If Cost Analysis is not enabled, follow the on-screen instructions to enable it.
Set filters to view specific cost information.
- Example 1: View cost breakdowns by cost center (costcenter).
  1. From the Category drop-down list, select Instance Tag.
  2. From the tag key drop-down list, select costcenter.
  3. From the Time Granularity drop-down list, select Month.
  4. Set a time range of up to 12 months.
- Example 2: View costs for a specific project (project).
  1. In the Filter area on the right, click Tag.
  2. Select a tag. For example, to query the costs for Project A, select the project:project A tag.
    
    You can select multiple tags. Results match any selected tag (OR logic).
  3. Click Apply.
Optional: In the upper-right corner of the cost report, click