Billing accounts and budgets in GCP - Cheat Sheet & Quick Revision

Recall & Review

beginner

What is a billing account in Google Cloud Platform?

A billing account is where your Google Cloud costs are tracked and paid from. It links your projects to a payment method like a credit card or invoicing.

beginner

What is the purpose of a budget in Google Cloud billing?

A budget helps you set spending limits and alerts. It notifies you when your costs approach or exceed the set amount to avoid surprises.

intermediate

How can you receive alerts when your Google Cloud spending reaches a certain threshold?

By creating a budget with alert rules that send notifications via email or Pub/Sub when spending hits defined percentages of the budget.

beginner

Can multiple projects share the same billing account in GCP?

Yes, multiple projects can be linked to a single billing account to consolidate payments and manage costs centrally.

intermediate

What happens if a billing account is closed or disabled in GCP?

All projects linked to that billing account lose access to billable services and may be suspended until a valid billing account is attached.

What is required to create a billing account in GCP?

A A service account

B A Google Cloud project

C A budget with alerts

D A payment method like a credit card or invoicing setup

A billing account needs a payment method to pay for Google Cloud usage.

Which of the following can you NOT do with a budget in GCP?

A Automatically stop services when budget is exceeded

B Set spending limits and receive alerts

C Track costs across projects linked to a billing account

D Receive notifications via email or Pub/Sub

Budgets alert you but do not automatically stop services.

If you want to monitor costs for multiple projects together, what should you do?

A Link all projects to the same billing account

B Create separate budgets for each project

C Use different billing accounts for each project

D Disable billing on all projects

Linking projects to the same billing account allows consolidated cost tracking.

What happens when a billing account linked to a project is closed?

A The project continues to run without charges

B The project is deleted immediately

C The project loses access to billable services

D The project automatically switches to a new billing account

Without an active billing account, billable services stop working.

Which notification method can be used for budget alerts in GCP?

A Physical mail

B Email

C Phone call

D SMS text message

Budget alerts can be sent via email or Pub/Sub, but not SMS or phone calls directly.

Explain what a billing account is and how it relates to projects in Google Cloud.

Think about how you pay for your cloud usage and how projects connect to that payment.

Describe how budgets help manage cloud spending and what happens when spending approaches the budget limit.

Consider budgets as your spending guardrails with warning signals.