Points Allocation

Overview

Point Allocation is a feature to help multiple teams manage usage under a single Catchpoint contract. It can be used to to simply allocate and measure usage per team, and optionally to restrict each team to their share of the contract points by enforcing the allocation. If enforced, the UI will prevent any edits that are projected to cause the team's point usage to exceed its allocation.

To use this feature, the client must have the following:

• Active contract
• Division Allocation: automatically enabled if Divisions are enabled
• Product Allocation: must be enabled in Client properties

Setting an Allocation

Setting an Allocation creates a total static share of contract points for the Product or Division, and continually measures usage against that share. The allocation applies to all Products, Folders, and Tests contained within the Division or Product. An account would need to have Divisions in order see the Client-level allocation option. If there are no Divisions, overall usage cannot be tracked with Division allocation.

Setting an Allocation only enables usage tracking, not enforcement. Overages can still occur, but the overage will be measured to track which team went into overages. If you do not want a Division or Product to use more points than allocated, you must also use the Enforcement setting.

• Once an item is allocated, all used points from the start of the contract are deducted from the allocated share
• Available points are the points remaining in the allocation
• Available points divided by days left in the contract are used to establish a daily rate (This is found at the top-left of the Points Allocation screen)
• This daily rate establishes the baseline usage the Division or Product would need to maintain to exactly use all allocated points at contract end.
• The total daily rate (top left) is calculated as Available Points / Contract Days Remaining, and the Daily Rate per allocation (in the table) is calculated as Allocation / Contract Days Remaining.
• An allocated item has 'exceeded its allocation' in the following two scenarios:
  • If the actual daily rate exceeds the allocated daily rate.
  • If the total used points are greater than the allocated points.

To set an allocation, you must have the Manage Allocation > Create and Modify permission.

1. In the Settings module, go to the Point Allocations and click 'Edit'

Note: you will not be able to allocate usage if any of the following conditions apply:

• Your organization has no active contract
• Parent is not allocated (applies only to allocating points to Products within a Division)
• You attempt to allocate 0 points
• You attempt to allocate more points than are available under your contract
• You attempt to allocate more points to a Product than are available to its parent Division

2. Choose whether to input allocation amounts using points or percent of contract. The allocation input is the total points for the allocation, measured from the contract start. Percent of points is calculated from the total contract points or total allocated points.

   • If it is a Division or Product without Division allocation: % is applied to the total contract points
   • If it is a Product under an allocated Division, % is applied to the division's total allocation.

3. To create a new Allocation,

   • click the '+' in the Not Allocated portion of the table
   • add your amount in the input box in the Allocations column and confirm your allocation to the right of the input box

4. To edit an existing item, just update the input box

5. Click Save to apply your changes.

Note: If the account is in overage and enforcement is enabled, then the user may experience issues, eg when Adding a new Enterprise node

Tracking the Allocation

After allocating points to a Product or Division, allocation data and status warnings are available in the Portal.

1. To view current usage: use the Points Allocation page
   Note: you must have Manage Allocation > View permission.

The Allocation Table page shows point usage from the current and previous day, and current allocated totals for each Division or Product. Red cells indicate an item is exceeding its allocation for the day or in total.

2. To understand usage while editing items that impact points, use the Point Estimator
   Note: you must have at least Manage Tests > View permission

Once an allocation is set, Point Estimators on allocated Product, Folder, and Test property screens will include allocation data and allowance status.

The Allocation Allowance is an approximation that compares the Product or Division's real-time usage rates to the allocated daily rate. The difference is the remaining Allowance.

• Products and Folders must have active tests to calculate Allocation Allowance
• If there is a negative allowance, i.e. recent data shows real-time rates are greater than allocated rates, the Point Estimator will be red.
• If there is a positive allowance, i.e. there is room in the allocation for more usage, the Point Estimator will be green.

While editing allocated Products, Folders, or Tests, the Allowance will update in real time by estimating the impact of the edit to the allowance. If the edit is at the Product or Folder level, the estimate will account for inheritance by contained Tests. If the edit is at the Test level, the estimate is for that test only.

• If the edit is predicted to cause the usage rate to exceed the allocation, the Point Estimator will be red
• If the edit is estimated to be within allocated usage rate boundaries, the Point Estimator will be green

The Point Estimator also shows additional data to aid with editing:
(Test properties accessed via tooltip)

• % of Allocation: the ratio between the estimated usage rates for the test and the overall allocated rate.
• Allowance: the difference between the real-time usage rates and the allocated rate.
• Allocated Hourly Rate: The hourly rate of the allocation based on available points
• Hourly Rate: The current estimated hourly rate of point usage for the test

Note: for allocated Products in an allocated Division, all edits are considered against the Product allocation. The Product Point Estimation also includes the Division allocation to help understand the impact the Product usage overall has on the Division.

Allocation Warning Report

To get automatic daily warnings about items that are exceeding their allocation: use the Allocation Warning Report

The Allocation Warning email checks daily if an allocated item exceeds its daily rate. This signals that if usage continues at this rate, the Product or Division is estimated to consume allocated points before the contract ends. The Warning Report starts at midnight, client time, and the warning email goes out at this daily reset time.

• At the client level, the Allocation Warning Report also checks for the daily total rates for all allocated and unallocated items.
  To add recipients to this report, subscribe via the Point Allocations page.
• Recipients will receive allocation warnings for the data included on that page

Receiving Allocation Warning Report email with no Items

We only show the items (divisions/products) that are breaching the daily allocations in the Allocation Warning Report.

• In case we do not allocate points to any division/product and the client consumption breaches the default Daily Rate we will get an email in which there will be no items present and this is expected.
• Similarly if points are allocated and no division/product is breaching the daily allocated threshold but the total points consumed (which includes the Client, allocated and unallocated items) breaches the default Daily Rate we will get an email with no items present.

Enforcing an Allocation

Enforcing an allocation will prevent any changes to allocated Test, Folder, or Property pages while the Point Estimator is signaling there is no room in the allocation. Enforcing will not stop any active tests from running. It is only applied to the creation and editing of allocated Products, Folders, and Tests.

If the Point Estimator is red, the user will not be able to save the Product, Folder, or Test unless they make changes to reduce the usage to allowable levels.

• Editing Products and Folders will account for the tests inheriting Targeting settings

Note: The allowance is an approximation from recent data and thus may not detect the impact of immediate preceding actions, such as editing several tests or drastically reducing usage. Go to the Point Allocation page for real-time tracking of usage rates or subscribe to the Allocation Warning Report for a daily usage warning.

• If immediate changes in testing are required, disabling the enforcement will allow changes

Best Practices

Editing/creating allocated Products, Folders, or Tests

• When creating new Products or Folders, keep in mind that the allowance is approximated from recent data. Some changes will not be caught by the Point Estimator in realtime.
  • When creating tests, refer to the % of Allocation on the point estimator tooltip to get an understanding of how much usage of the allocation that test is predicted to have.
• If you are creating or editing Products, Folders, or Tests and are getting stopped due to allocation enforcement, then you have the following options:
  • Mark the item as 'inactive' and Save, this will keep the current settings
  • Cancel and the current testing will stay the same
  • Contact an admin to modify the enforcement
  • Wait for the allowance to detect any recent drastic reduction in usage. This may take 1-3 hours.

Allocation Manager

• Make sure you have a good understanding of each team's required usage before enforcing the allocation.
• You can enable/disable enforcement at any time.
• You can re-allocate points at any time. The total used will always be from the contract start date, even if reallocated.
  • If you want to allocate only on remaining points, account for total used points already
• The enforcement will not stop existing tests. So if something is enforced, but the allocated item's usage rate is already over the allocated usage rate, then that item will go in to overages unless manual changes are made to reduce usage.
• Since the allowance approximation is based on recent data, it might take a moment for recent changes to take effect.
• Be sure to sign up for allocation warning emails. Pay attention to those as they will catch any rate changes not caught by the allowance approximation.
• When creating new Products or Folders - keep an eye on usage or check back within three hours.