Enable usage quotas¶

Switch on the usage extension, a second consumer that counts a tenant's meter into a cache with an hourly reconciler, in a stream-mode installation. How it works: usage quotas.

Before you start¶

Run stream mode: without a stream a second consumer has nothing to read.
Declare a meter: in the catalogue, as in enable billing. What is capped is what is billed.
Run a cache (Valkey or compatible) and a decision point of your own, such as the gateway's external authorisation.
extensions.quotas takes enabled only and renders nothing yet. A cache: or period: key fails the values schema. The chart refuses it without mode: stream.
This is not burst rate limiting. Decide "fifty requests a second" in the gateway's rate limiter.
Fail open and say so. A cold cache means the tenant used nothing: serve the customer and record that you decided without a count. The reconciler corrects it within the hour.

Steps¶

Enable it in a stream-mode installation.

audit:
  mode: stream
  extensions:
    quotas:
      enabled: true

Declare a refusal as an async action in the application's catalogue, so "you cut me off" has an answer.

Verify¶

helm template renders, and refuses with mode: direct.

Roll back¶

Set enabled: false.

Watch¶

Watch the usage consumer's lag apart from the writer's, the reconciler's drift and denials. Growing drift means the consumer is missing records. A sudden rise in denials is an attack or a misconfigured plan.