Understanding Usage & Budgets
The portal helps you keep cellular usage on track by comparing what a line is using against a budget. This page explains the key ideas; the following pages show where to see your usage and how alerts work.
Billing periods
Cellular usage is measured over a billing period — typically a month that follows your carrier's billing cycle. Within a period, the portal tracks usage as it accumulates and compares it against budget.
Unbilled vs. billed usage
- Unbilled (current period) — a running, up-to-date estimate of what a line is using during the current period, before the carrier's invoice arrives. This is what powers day-to-day tracking and early alerts.
- Billed (closed period) — the final, confirmed amounts once the carrier's invoice for the period is processed. This is what you see in history and in summaries.
Because unbilled figures are estimates from in-period data, they can differ slightly from the final billed amounts.
Budgets and projections
A budget is the target amount set for a line over a billing period. As usage accumulates, the portal projects where the line is likely to end the period and compares that projection against the budget. When a line is trending over budget, the portal can send an overage alert.
Who sets budgets?
Budgets are configured by your organization's administrator. Not every line has a budget — if no budget applies to a line, that line is simply tracked without overage alerts. Administrators can read more in the Administration section (coming soon).
In this section
- Viewing Your Usage — see your current usage and history.
- Viewing Your Team's Usage — (managers) your team's usage, with a direct-reports or full-team scope.
- Organization Usage & Reports — (administrators) all lines, line detail, and closed-period summaries.
- Overage Alerts Explained — what triggers an alert and when.