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But wouldn't have helped much here unless you're watching your email like a hawk

Totally agree. I have alerts for 50% and 120%. If I get the 50% in the first week I'm digging in then. If I get the 120% I'm watching it like a hawk from then on (and letting accounting know).

The article says they would not have helped but it doesn't say why... Maybe because it's delayed by a day?

agreed

They don't.

But let's say you are:

- on holidays

- sleeping

- sick

- on a party

- etc.

Having setup alerts would still have reduced the bill.

Still assuming that something like 2h pass before you can react to an email is quite reasonable which would still have been ~150$ on the big day, which is ~6x of the normal _monthly_ cost in 2h...

And that is assuming the alerts are send real-time, which they are not.

I've found this useful to get started:

https://github.com/billtrust/terraform-aws-billing-alarm