AWS Billing Glitch Shows Some Customers Bills of Billions

Amazon Web Services customers saw billing estimates jump from pennies to billions of dollars on Friday after a software error in the company's estimated billing computation subsystem. The glitch began displaying incorrect data late Thursday evening. Amazon paused estimated billing computations and began rolling back a recent change to the subsystem.

One customer who normally pays two cents per month received an estimate exceeding $1.5 billion for July usage. Other reported figures reached $22 billion, $75 billion, and $110 billion. Amazon confirmed the estimates do not reflect actual usage or charges. The company said customers do not owe the displayed amounts.

Amazon spokesperson Aisha Johnson referred inquiries to the AWS Service Health Dashboard. The dashboard stated the issue is global and should be resolved by the weekend. No customer actions are required, according to the dashboard. Amazon has not said whether any accounts were suspended.

“I've had this account for 6+ years and in that time my monthly spend has never exceeded $0.02.”

One Reddit user posted a screenshot showing $7.1 trillion in estimated fees since July 1. Amazon said the root cause was an issue with unit pricing inside the billing subsystem.