Skip to main content
Your progress
0 of 5 complete0%
T4 / M4.8 / L4 OF 4 / Architect LEVEL / 9 min

Savings overlay: "$X reclaimable"

Outcome

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to use the savings overlay to identify reclaimable spend in the Sankey, deep-link to filtered recommendations, and combine the savings overlay with the unattributed-teams overlay for diagnostic depth.


PrerequisitesM4.8.L1-L3 (Trend vs Flow, layouts, drill) · T1: Recommendations
Time9 minutes

1. Concept

Two things can be laid over the diagram.

The first marks the savings recorded against each flow, which the product calls reclaimable spend. The second marks spend from resources assigned to no team.

Between them they change the question the picture answers, from where the money went to where you should go next.

Terminal window
WITHOUT OVERLAYS:
Sankey shows flow size only
Each flow's color = neutral
User sees composition; must navigate elsewhere to act
WITH SAVINGS OVERLAY:
Flows with recorded savings get a red stripe
Hover any flow: inspector shows "$X reclaimable" if any
Click the callout (on a type or account node): deep-link
to filtered Recommendations
WITH UNATTRIBUTED OVERLAY:
Flows into the Unattributed team bucket (resources with no
team assignment) are highlighted yellow
Distinguishes "where the money goes" from
"where the money has no owning team"
BOTH OVERLAYS ON:
Red-and-yellow striped flows = double signal
(no team + reclaimable)

What “reclaimable” means

Terminal window
RECLAIMABLE (as the overlay computes it) =
SUM of the savings recorded on the flow's cost records
(each record's savings = its 24/7 cost minus its actual cost)
split across teams by share count, exactly like cost
For a flow showing "prod-aws-us-east-1 → EKS → team-platform":
Reclaimable = SUM(savings) over the cost records in that flow

It is not a sum over open recommendations, and there is no separate recommendations query behind the overlay. Read it as the savings tied to that slice of spend; to see the open recommendations for the slice, use the deep-link.

Filtering recommendations from overlay

The savings overlay’s most useful feature: deep-linking to filtered recommendations.

Terminal window
USER CLICKS the "$2,400 reclaimable" callout on a flow
OPENS Recommendations (/recommendations/cost) with ONE filter
pre-applied, taken from the node you clicked:
resource_type = EKS (for a type node)
or cloud_account = … (for an account node)
RESULT:
Recommendations list shows the EKS recommendations, ready to
triage directly.
NO MANUAL FILTER CONSTRUCTION required.

This is the bridge between “Cost Flow analysis” (where the money goes) and “Recommendations action” (what to do about it). Without the deep-link, the user would have to read the flow, open Recommendations separately, construct matching filters, and confirm they match. The deep-link compresses 30 seconds of navigation into one click.

Limitations

Terminal window
SUPPORTED DEEP-LINK FILTERS (one at a time):
resource_type
cloud_account (URL parameter; the node's dimension is the
cloud account)
NOT SUPPORTED (the node's callout is hidden):
team_id
provider
region
service_name
purchase_type
WHEN A CALLOUT IS HIDDEN:
The savings still show on hover in the inspector
Workaround: open Recommendations and filter manually

This is a known limitation; future versions are likely to support more dimensions. The current set covers the most-common drill paths.

Unattributed teams overlay

Terminal window
SEPARATE OVERLAY: Unattributed teams highlight
When toggled on:
Spend whose team resolves to the Unattributed bucket (no
team assignment) is highlighted in yellow
Flows that feed that bucket show the yellow tint
Hover: inspector shows the unowned amount and share of spend
USE CASES:
- Ownership audits
- Identifying which dimensions carry the most unowned spend
- Finding orphan resources (often the ones nobody assigned)

The unattributed overlay is the visual companion to the Unattributed row in Cost Reports → Teams (M4.5.L2). Where the report gives a total, the overlay shows where that unowned spend sits in the Sankey.

Combining overlays

Terminal window
BOTH OVERLAYS ON SIMULTANEOUSLY:
Red-striped: recorded savings (reclaimable)
Yellow-highlighted: spend with no owning team
Red-and-yellow: both
INTERPRETATION:
Red only: savings in play; check the recommendations
Yellow only: ownership gap; assign the resources to a team
Red and yellow: double opportunity: no owner AND savings in
play. Often orphan resources from departed
users; assign + act, or just delete.
The red-and-yellow flows are usually the highest-leverage.

When to use the savings overlay

Terminal window
SCENARIO USE OVERLAY?
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Weekly Operate review Yes: find this week's
action items
Monthly cost review for leadership No: overlay adds noise to
executive view; show the
number separately
Quarterly optimization sprint Yes: primary tool for
finding savings
Anomaly investigation Maybe: sometimes the
anomaly is from open recs
not yet applied
Initial onboarding / exploration Yes: surfaces value
immediately

The overlay adds visual complexity. Use it when the additional information helps; turn it off when a clean view is needed.

Example overlay state

Terminal window
COST FLOW with savings overlay, BY SERVICE layout:
Provider → Account → Service → Team
AWS → prod-us → EKS → team-ml-infra
████░░░░ ███████░ ████░░░
▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▒ (red stripes: $4.2K)
AWS → prod-us → RDS → team-platform
████░░░░ ███░░░░░ ██░░░░░
(red stripes: $1.1K)
GCP → dev → Compute → Unattributed
██░░░░░░ █░░░░░░░ █░░░░░░░
░░░░░░░░ ░░░░░░░░ ░░░░░░░░ (yellow: $480)
(red+yellow: $480 from unowned compute,
also has recorded savings)
LEGEND:
▒▒▒ = red stripe (reclaimable savings)
░░░ = yellow tint (no team assignment)

The visual encoding makes opportunities pop out of the Sankey.

Weekly Operate ritual

The savings overlay is at the center of a productive Weekly Operate ritual:

Terminal window
WEEKLY (20 minutes):
T+0 Open Cost Flow, default layout, this-week scope
T+1 Toggle savings overlay
T+2 Identify the largest red-striped flow
T+3 Click the callout → filtered Recommendations
T+5 Triage 3-5 recommendations
(apply / dismiss / investigate further)
T+10 Repeat for next red-striped flow
T+18 Document acted recommendations in team wiki
T+20 Close loop
OUTCOME over time:
Reclaimable savings decline as recs are applied
The Unattributed share shrinks as resources are assigned
The overlay becomes "the thing I scan weekly"

How ZopNight uses the overlays

The overlay states are URL-encoded alongside layout and drill (flowSavings, flowUnattr). The toggle states persist across Sankey reloads. The savings figure comes from the same cost data as the flow itself, split by team share count; the unattributed highlight follows the team assignment behind each flow. There is no separate overlay query or cache.


2. Demo

A weekly Operate cycle using the overlay:

Terminal window
TIME: Monday morning, 9:15 AM
GOAL: This week's recommendations to triage
T+0 Open Costs → Flow
T+5 s Toggle "Savings overlay" → on
T+10 s Scan the Sankey for red-striped flows
Three biggest:
1. AWS → prod-us → EKS → team-platform $2,400
2. AWS → prod-us → RDS → team-product $1,100
3. GCP → prod → BigQuery → team-data $750
T+30 s Click the callout on the EKS node ($2,400)
T+35 s Recommendations page opens filtered:
resource_type=EKS
Sees 8 open EKS recommendations
T+1 min Triage:
- 5 right-sizing recs (low risk) → apply now
- 2 idle-cluster recs (need owner approval) → assign
- 1 spot-instance switch (medium risk) → defer
T+3 min Apply the 5 right-sizing recs (one-click each)
T+5 min Switch back to Cost Flow; click the RDS callout ($1,100)
T+5:30 Recommendations opens for RDS in prod-us
Triage: 4 recs; 3 apply now, 1 defer
T+8 min Click the BigQuery callout ($750)
T+8:30 BigQuery recs (snapshot lifecycle, query optimization)
Triage: 2 recs; both deferred (need data team owner)
T+10 min Switch on Unattributed overlay; notice yellow on flow:
GCP → dev → Compute → Unattributed
12 compute resources with no team assignment
T+11 min Hover the flow to see the unowned amount
Identify the resources
Assign them to a team or flag for cleanup
T+15 min Document in team wiki:
"This week: applied 8 recs (5 EKS, 3 RDS) of the
$3.5K/mo flagged across those two flows; the rest are
assigned or deferred. Assigned 12 GCP compute
resources to teams."
ELAPSED: 15 minutes to act on most of $3,500/mo of flagged
savings, plus ownership hygiene.

3. Hands-on (5 min)

Use the savings overlay:

Terminal window
OPEN Costs → Flow → toggle Savings overlay
LARGEST RED-STRIPED FLOWS (top 3 you see):
1. __________ Reclaimable: $__________
2. __________ Reclaimable: $__________
3. __________ Reclaimable: $__________
TOTAL VISIBLE RECLAIMABLE: $__________
PICK ONE FLOW; click its callout:
Recommendations opened? Yes / No
Filter scope: __________
Number of recommendations: _____
ACTION you can take this week:
□ Apply N recommendations (low-risk)
□ Assign owner for high-risk recs
□ Defer specific recs (note why)
□ Combine with team meeting
UNATTRIBUTED OVERLAY:
Toggle on. Largest unowned flow:
__________ Unowned amount: $__________
Assignment plan: __________

If you have no red-striped flows, your team is in optimal state: recommendations are kept current. Time to switch focus to ownership hygiene or unit-economics improvements.


4. Knowledge check

Q1

A red-striped flow indicates:

A. A cloud provider billing error somewhere in the flow
B. Savings are recorded on the cost records in this flow
C. A particularly high-cost flow within the cascade
D. An anomaly that the detector flagged on that flow

Show answer

Correct: B. The stripe shows the savings recorded on that flow’s cost records, which the inspector labels reclaimable. On a type or account node, the callout deep-links to the matching recommendations.

Q2

The deep-link from a savings callout:

A. Opens Recommendations filtered to the clicked node’s resource type or cloud account
B. Opens the Recommendations page entirely unfiltered, so you have to re-filter it yourself again
C. Just shows the count of open recommendations without linking anywhere at all that is useful
D. Opens the resource list filtered to that flow, but never the recommendations themselves

Show answer

Correct: A. One filter, taken from the node: resource type or cloud account. It saves building the filter by hand and is the bridge between Cost Flow and Recommendations.

Q3

The deep-link works for which dimensions?

A. Every single dimension available in the cascade
B. None of them at all; the linking is manual only
C. Only the team and the cloud account dimensions
D. Only the resource type and cloud account dimensions

Show answer

Correct: D. On nodes of any other dimension (team, provider, region, service, purchase type) the callout is hidden; open Recommendations and filter manually.


5. Apply

Toggle the savings overlay in Costs → Flow. The toggle is in the upper-right of the Sankey view. The unattributed overlay is in the same toggle group.

For weekly Operate cadence, build the savings-overlay scan into your routine. 15-20 minutes per week is sufficient to capture most recoverable savings.


Glossary terms touched

Unattributed spend


Module quiz

Complete M4.8 → 10-question module quiz.


Start with the bill.

Foundations takes about five hours. The first lesson is nine minutes.

Free curriculum. No paywall. 290 lessons across 7 courses, plus an optional 24-lesson beginner course. Browse every course without an account; a free account opens the lessons, saves your progress and opens the exams for three publicly verifiable credentials. Read it on the train, take the exam on a Saturday, list the credential on your résumé Monday.

5h median time to finish Foundations
free account, every course, no paywall
3 certifications, each with a public verifier
Multi-cloud automation· Production-ready in 30 min· SOC 2 · ISO 27001· 20–60% off the bill, first month· 4 platforms · 1 console· Multi-cloud automation· Production-ready in 30 min· SOC 2 · ISO 27001· 20–60% off the bill, first month· 4 platforms · 1 console·