Reduce Your Cloud Costs by Avoiding these Common Mistakes

Cloud computing has transformed how businesses operate, offering flexibility, scalability, and access to powerful productivity tools.  

It should save them money, too, but that’s not always the case. In fact, 91% of organisations admit they’re wasting money in the cloud. Why is this? The reasons vary, but three major culprits consistently show up: a lack of cloud-specific skills, overprovisioned resources, and idle or underused assets. 

In a recent episode of the Experts in Polo Shirts podcast, Synextra consultants Matt and Ryan broke down these common pitfalls, sharing their insights into how organisations can avoid them. Feel free to check out the linked video to enjoy the full discussion (we’ve highlighted some key quotes below).   

Read on if you’re looking to make smarter cloud spending decisions – here’s what you need to know about how to reduce your cloud costs.  

One of the biggest challenge organisations face when managing cloud costs is a lack of specialised skills. Cloud platforms like Azure are incredibly powerful, but it’s also incredibly complex. Without the right expertise, companies can easily overlook hidden costs or configure their environments inefficiently. 

As Matt points out in the podcast: “Azure can be a beast. If you don’t have the skills, it’s easy to miss things like bandwidth or backup costs, which can spiral out of control.” For example, spinning up a VM might seem straightforward, but in the background, it can trigger additional services — each with its own price tag. 

While your team does need technical knowledge, understanding Azure’s cost structure is just as important. Many businesses assume that moving to the cloud will automatically save money, but without expertise, they can replicate old, inefficient practices. Ryan explains, “If you try to do it yourself without experience, you’re just going to see costs everywhere.” 

How can you address skill gaps like this? Investing in your team’s cloud-specific abilities is essential, and it can involve training your in-house team, hiring experienced specialists, or partnering with an expert MSP who can guide you. Tools like Azure Advisor can help identify potential cost optimisations, but they work best when paired with human expertise. 

Additionally, third-party monitoring tools can provide deeper insights into your cloud usage, offering recommendations that go beyond Azure’s built-in capabilities. Making this investment upfront, you’ll not only avoid wasted spend but also unlock the full potential of your cloud environment. 

Overprovisioning might feel like the safe choice during a cloud migration, but it’s one of the biggest drivers of unnecessary spending. When businesses copy their on-premises infrastructure to the cloud without optimisation, they often replicate inefficiencies. As Ryan puts it, “Migration is probably the biggest cause of that. Someone just copies exactly what they had on-prem without thinking about how Azure’s resources compare to their 10-year-old servers.” 

The issue often stems from assumptions about capacity. Matt notes, “On-prem, people would just overprovision because it was easier and safer. But in Azure, those same assumptions lead to waste — especially if you never go back to scale things down.” For example, a virtual machine with two CPUs and 4GB of RAM in an on-prem environment might not offer the same performance if you built that in Azure. Modern cloud resources are often more powerful, meaning you could achieve the same performance with a smaller setup. 

Overprovisioning isn’t just about virtual machines either. Disk sizes, storage types, and unused services can quickly bloat your bill. “We’ve seen people dump data into archive storage without fully understanding the cost of retrieving it,” Matt adds.  

The key takeaway? Don’t blindly copy your existing setup. Instead, assess what’s truly needed and make use of Azure’s monitoring tools to identify opportunities for scaling down when it’s appropriate. 

Idle and underused cloud resources: The overlooked money drain 

Idle resources are another common budget killer. These include virtual machines, disks, and other services that are no longer actively used but still running — or even resources that were never properly decommissioned after a project ended. “It’s so easy for things to get away from you,” Ryan says. “Maybe a developer clones a VM for testing but forgets to delete it, or you end up with dozens of disks from old projects just sitting there, adding up month by month.” 

The challenge becomes even greater in bigger organisations with multiple teams accessing Azure. Without proper governance, it’s easy for departments to spin up resources without clear ownership or accountability. Tags and naming conventions can help, but robust policies are pretty much essential to prevent chaos. “We’ve seen organisations paying for hundreds of disks they didn’t realise were still live,” Matt added. “Each one might only cost £15 a month, but when you multiply that across hundreds of resources, it really adds up.” 

Azure Cost Management tools

Azure’s native cost management tools can help by flagging underused resources, but Matt and Ryan both suggest going a step further with third-party monitoring tools. These provide more granular insights and can even automate processes like shutting down idle VMs outside of business hours. “Think of it as cloud hygiene,” Ryan said. “You need to stay on top of what you’re using — and just as importantly, what you’re not using.” 

Without strong governance, even the best cloud cost management tools can only do so much. A lack of clear processes around provisioning, tagging, and decommissioning resources can lead to unnecessary costs. “It’s not just about monitoring — it’s also about policing,” Ryan points out. “If you don’t have the right alerts and policies in place, costs can spiral before anyone notices.” 

Governance begins with accountability. Tags can help identify resource owners, but company-wide policies are critical to ensuring teams follow best practices. Matt adds, “We’ve seen organisations where multiple departments have access to Azure, and it’s not always clear who is responsible for what. Without limits on subscriptions or clear accountability, costs can easily slip through the cracks.” 

Another overlooked aspect of governance is setting expiration dates for temporary resources. People might spin up a resource for a short-term project and forget about it. And months later, it’s still running, racking up costs. Automation can help here, with policies that alert teams to idle resources or enforce expiration dates for temporary setups. 

Governance is really about creating a culture of awareness and responsibility. Everyone from developers to executives needs to understand the financial implications of their cloud decisions.  

It’s not just IT’s job anymore. Cloud adoption needs buy-in from the entire organisation, especially at the leadership level. 

Reducing cloud costs doesn’t always mean spending less — spending smarter is often the way to go. By understanding your workloads and making use of Azure’s pricing options, you can optimise costs without compromising performance. Reserved instances, saving plans, and scaling schedules are powerful tools, but they require planning and expertise. 

Cloud is all about flexibility, but you sometimes have to give up a bit of that to save money. Reserved instances, for example, allow you to lock in lower prices for virtual machines and other resources over a one- or three-year term. This works well for workloads you know will be running 24/7, such as domain controllers or monitoring servers. It’s like going back to how you planned on-prem infrastructure — you buy for the long term, but you still get the flexibility of the cloud. 

Another easy win is using scaling plans to turn off resources outside of business hours. If you’ve got resources that only need to run 8am to 5pm, Monday to Friday, scaling plans can save a significant amount. For example, shutting down Azure Virtual Desktop hosts overnight can cost less than reserving them for full-time use. 

Finally, think beyond the immediate cost savings. Reinvesting the money saved into optimisation projects or new tools can deliver long-term value. The best organisations use the money they save to make the business even better. That doesn’t mean cutting corners — instead, it’s about creating opportunities. 

With the right tools, proactive governance, and resource optimisation, your cloud environment can transform from a budgetary burden to a powerful enabler for growth. 

If you tackle common pitfalls like overprovisioning, idle resources, and skill gaps, you can reduce waste without sacrificing performance. And as always, you’ll want to align cloud spending with business goals, making sure every pound spent drives value. 

Dealing with this isn’t just IT’s job these days — cloud success depends on buy-in from the entire organisation, from developers to C-suite leaders. When everyone works together, your cloud environment will serve as a brilliant platform for business that won’t cost the earth.  

So, whether you’re just starting your cloud journey or looking to optimise an established setup, remember: smart cloud spending isn’t about spending less. It’s about spending better. 

For more guidance and strategies on keeping costs low and performance high, speak to our experts in Azure cost optimisation.

If you’re ready to take control of your Azure spending, don’t hesitate to get in touch with Synextra. Our team of cloud experts can help you unlock savings and drive real value from your cloud investments.