AWS: General

These Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) answer the most common questions we get asked about the relationship between CloudCheckr and AWS.

Question: How long does it take CloudCheckr to collect my AWS data?
Answer:

The time frame for data collection varies for each data source and service.

CloudCheckr collects AWS data from S3 buckets, the Detailed Billing Report (DBR), the Cost and Usage Report (CUR), CloudWatch, CloudTrail, AWS Config, and the AWS API.

Collector

Time Frame

S3
  • Depends on the number of S3 objects you are storing within AWS
  • By default, CloudCheckr collects 1 million objects daily
    If you are looking for total object limits, refer to the Summary or List of S3 Buckets pages (Inventory > S3 > Summary and Inventory > S3 > List of S3 Buckets). If the system hits the S3 object limit, you may only see a subset of the data. If you need the S3 Top 10 metadata, contact Support to increase your limit. CloudCheckr only provides this increase on an individual account basis.
  • By default, CloudCheckr runs your S3 updates once every 7 days

DBR

  • CloudCheckr starts with the most recent month and works back to the first month it was generated
  • Allows you to see your most recent costs information while CloudCheckr gathers all available data
  • Smaller accounts: billing data for current month is available within 10-15 minutes while billing data for all months is available within an hour
  • Larger AWS accounts: initial collection may take up to 24 hours
  • In the normal account life cycle:
    • AWS updates the DBR once every 6 hours
    • CloudCheckr will continually scan for new billing data and will perform an update when it finds new data, which for small- and mid-sized accounts is approximately 4 times daily

CUR

In the normal account life cycle, AWS updates the CUR once every 6 hours.

CloudWatch

CloudCheckr collects your CloudWatch data every six hours but it can collect up to 4 times a day

CloudTrail/AWS Config

CloudCheckr collects your CloudTrail/AWS Config files every hour

AWS API
  • CloudCheckr collects a complete inventory of your resources and settings every 24 hours
  • Time frame depends on the size of your AWS deployment:
    • Smaller AWS accounts: 30 minutes
    • Larger accounts: 1-2 hours but may take up to 24 hours
  • CloudCheckr will send a Summary email when your data is available
Question: Why don't I see resources for my payee accounts if I provided my AWS master account credentials?
Answer:

When adding the credentials of a master payer account, CloudCheckr shows complete cost data across the entire Consolidated Billing Family. However, AWS does not provide any Inventory, CloudWatch, or CloudTrail data for payee accounts within the payer accounts. If you want CloudCheckr to report on payee accounts, you must apply IAM credentials to each payee account.

Answer:

As part of their invoice preparation, AWS stops writing updates to the billing file on the last day of the month. As a result,

CloudCheckr will not trigger any billing-related emails because the billing data will be incomplete for that day.

Once AWS closes the month, they will write the remaining hours for the last day of the month. CloudCheckr will see that the month is closed and automatically reload the billing file. Once the month's billing is finalized, CloudCheckr will trigger the billing-related emails.

Question: What is the difference between CloudWatch billing data and the DBR or CUR billing file?
Answer:

CloudWatch has more limited data. AWS only provides a net bill for the month, and often, does not report it on a regular schedule. AWS writes the billing file to the master account's S3 bucket. It contains all cost information, including credits, has greater consistency, and allows for greater analysis with full tags, timing, grouping, and other relevant details. For this reason, we strongly recommend using the DBR or CUR billing file.

Question: Why doesn't the dashboard display my AWS billing information?
Answer:

You must enable the DBR, CUR, or the CloudWatch Bill Monitoring in your AWS account so that CloudCheckr can retrieve your billing information. For instructions on how to enable these features, review the Preparing Your AWS Account topic.

Question: How do I delete a CloudCheckr account?
Answer:

Log in to CloudCheckr and from the account list, locate the account you would like to delete. In the Actions column, select the icon and confirm your deletion request.

This action is not reversible. All data in the selected account will be permanently deleted.
Question: Will I incur additional charges from AWS if I use CloudCheckr?
Answer:

AWS does charge a very small fee per API call, which CloudCheckr uses to access your AWS account. For example, if you have 1 million S3 objects, AWS will charge you approximately $0.05 for CloudCheckr to inventory those files. For 1 billion S3 objects, AWS would charge you approximately $5.00.

Question: How do I change my password?
Answer:

From the menu bar in CloudCheckr, click the Settings icon and select User > Change Password. On the User Settings screen, type and confirm your new password and click Save Settings.

Question: Can I give others access to my CloudCheckr account?
Answer:

CloudCheckr customers can self-provision and manage access to their account. You can limit which accounts users can access, and whether they can view CloudCheckr's cost reports. You can also determine whether the users will be able to view Blended or Unblended costs within each cost report. For more information, review the User Management topic.

If you have any questions or need assistance with adding users, please contact our Support team.

Question: How can I view a complete list of my available accounts?
Answer:

CloudCheckr displays all of your accounts on the Accounts page. Click an account from the list to view the reports and data associated with that account. To select another account, go to the left navigation pane and click Back to List of Accounts to return to the Accounts page.

Question: Can I view my Trusted Advisor checks in CloudCheckr?
Answer:

Yes. You can enable CloudCheckr to import your AWS Trusted Advisor checks into your CloudCheckr account. To ensure that the AWS Trusted User checks are part of your Best Practices report, you must first grant 'support:*' permissions to your IAM user in CloudCheckr. This action will create a Trusted Advisor tab in your Best Practices report. Please contact our Support team if you need additional help.

Question: Can CloudCheckr report on AWS GovCloud?
Answer:

CloudCheckr is compatible with AWS GovCloud. However, if you have a GovCloud account and would like to use CloudCheckr, please contact our Support team.

Question: Why does CloudCheckr shows different costs than AWS Cost Explorer?
Answer:

Here are the main reasons:

  • CloudCheckr offers a List cost rate in addition to unblended and blended cost rates.
  • AWS Cost Explorer and CloudCheckr amortize RIs differently.
  • CloudCheckr provides RI unsharing and AWS Cost Explorer does not.
  • The transition from the Detailed Billing Report (DBR) to the Cost and Usage Report (CUR) drives changes in the line item values between these cost reports.
  • AWS Cost Explorer and CloudCheckr apply credits differently.
  • AWS Cost Explorer and CloudCheckr calculate AWS Marketplace charges differently.

For more information, review the Cost and Billing FAQ topic.

Question: Does CloudCheckr use the DBR or the CUR? If so, how does this affect me?
Answer:

At this time, CloudCheckr allows customers to use the DBR or the CUR, but recommends that existing customers enable the CUR as soon as possible since AWS plans to deprecate this method by the end of 2019. If you are new customer, our Customer Service Managers will help you set up the CUR during your onboarding.

For more information, review the Transition from DBR to CUR FAQ topic.

Question: How do I update the AWS Friendly Name?
Answer:

Click Instructions to see how to update the AWS Friendly Name.

Since CloudCheckr can now retrieve AWS friendly names from AWS Organizations programatically, we no longer rely on the Detailed Billing Report (DBR) to populate this information in our reports.
  1. Log in to the AWS Management Console using root user credentials.
    If you don't have root user credentials, you won't have access to the required options, so you must contact your internal AWS Admin who can complete the change for you.
  2. Go to the menu bar, click your account name, and select My Account from the fly-out menu.

    In the Account Settings section, you should see the Account Name, which is the AWS Friendly Name.

  3. Click Edit.
  4. Click the Edit button next to the AWS Friendly Name.
  5. Type your new AWS Friendly Name and click Update.

    AWS will process the name change in four hours. It may take CloudCheckr a day before it displays the updated name.

    You will see the updated name in your accounts list in CloudCheckr:

    You will also see the updated name in the Advanced Grouping report:

Question: Why does the final cost in my invoice indicate a charge rather than a discount?
Answer:

This scenario may occur when you apply a fixed custom billing charge or credit.

Custom billing charges adhere to basic rules of multiplication: when you multiply two negative numbers, you will get a positive value. For example, if your monthly spend is $200 and you configure a fixed discount of $500, your total will be negative. When you multiply that negative total by a Monthly Discount of -2.7%, you will get a positive number (charge) rather than a discount.

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