MS-900 Practice Question: Describe Microsoft 365 pricing, licensing, and support
An organization is reconciling their Microsoft 365 invoice and notices charges for 'Microsoft 365 Copilot' that they did not expect. The administrator suspects that users may have inadvertently enabled Copilot via self-service purchase. How should they prevent this in the future?
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often confuse reactive billing controls (like alerts or license removal) with the proactive administrative setting that actually blocks the self-service purchase mechanism, leading them to choose a non-preventive option.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Disable self-service purchasing in the Microsoft 365 admin center
Disabling self-service purchasing in the Microsoft 365 admin center is the direct method to prevent users from acquiring Copilot licenses on their own. Self-service purchasing allows users to buy subscriptions like Microsoft 365 Copilot without admin approval, leading to unexpected charges. By disabling this feature, the administrator regains control over license procurement, ensuring no future inadvertent Copilot activations occur.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Remove Copilot licenses from all users
Why it's wrong here
Removing Copilot licenses from all users revokes current assignments but leaves the tenant's self-service purchasing policy enabled. Users with sign-up permissions can simply re-purchase Copilot through Microsoft 365, immediately restoring the unauthorized charges and making the reconciliation problem recur. License removal is therefore only a stopgap, not a billing control.
- ✓
Disable self-service purchasing in the Microsoft 365 admin center
Why this is correct
Disable self-service purchasing in the Microsoft 365 admin center to prevent users from buying Copilot or other add-on licenses without admin approval. A Global or Billing Admin must change this tenant-level billing control, which addresses the root of the invoice discrepancy by stopping unauthorized future purchases. This is the only preventative option because it closes the purchasing channel users are exploiting.
- ✗
Cancel the Copilot subscription
Why it's wrong here
Copilot for Microsoft 365 is not a standalone subscription line you can cancel in isolation; it is an add-on license attached to an existing Microsoft 365 plan. There is no separate billing lifecycle to cancel, and attempting to do so would either remove all Copilot entitlements or leave the self-service mechanism intact. Therefore cancelation is structurally impossible as an invoice-reconciliation fix.
- ✗
Set up billing alerts for unexpected charges
Why it's wrong here
Setting up billing alerts only generates notifications after the invoice has posted, so it is a reactive monitoring tool rather than a preventive control. Alerts do not change the self-service purchasing configuration, meaning unauthorized Copilot purchases can continue to occur and will only be seen once money has already been committed. This helps detect future issues but cannot resolve the current invoice problem.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Microsoft 365 Admin Roles and Permissions
Key term
Microsoft 365 admin center
The Microsoft 365 admin center is a web-based portal where IT administrators manage users, subscriptions, security, and settings for an organization's Microsoft 365 services.
Key term
Microsoft 365
Microsoft 365 is a subscription-based cloud service from Microsoft that combines productivity tools like Office apps with security, device management, and online storage.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This MS-900 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Microsoft certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the MS-900 exam.