As a sysadmin, I hate that too.

For instance when they create a provisioning request, are you able to set an extremely low threshold? When they say that won't do, the cost increases and their able to see/understand and start to care about the actual lifecycles of what they're creating?

Surely there is a way to project and monitor the cost of their resources over time, and deliver them an invoice on a regular basis? In other words something like a cost attribution model? That way when the bills start to increase dramatically overtime, pinpointing the heavy hitters becomes trivial, and when they come knocking on your door to "do something about it" you can just say "go talk to Bob".

I don't mean to sound like I'm trivializing the problem (honestly I can relate as I've gone through it myself), but I'd love to hear how anyone else has dealt with this issue effectively.

i am a dev that has to deal with these regulations in my day to day. it is a pain, it is not freeing in any sense, and it makes my models worse.

granted, i think there are good reasons for it, but it does not make my life easier for sure.