The Complete SAM Pro Renewal Lifecycle: Reconciliation, Reclamation & Remediation - End to End

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The Five-Phase Lifecycle

SAM Pro operates as a closed-loop engine. When properly configured, it continuously discovers what's deployed, matches it against what you own, identifies waste and compliance risk, drives action, and feeds that intelligence back into the next renewal negotiation. Phase 5 loops directly back to Phase 1 - it's not a project, it's an ongoing process.

1: Discovery & Inventory: MID Server probes, SCCM/Intune connectors, agent-based collection - raw install data flows into cmdb_sam_sw_install

2: Entitlement Setup: Contracts, metric types, license quantities defined on ast_contract and alm_license telling SAM Pro what you actually own

3: Reconciliation: The engine matches installs vs entitlements, calculates your compliance position, and stores results.

4: Reclamation & Remediation: Over-licensed → reclamation workflow; under-licensed → remediation tasks with owners and SLAs

5: Contract Renewal: Renewal decisions informed by clean compliance data - updated contract records feed directly into the next cycle

Phase 1 & 2 - Discovery and Entitlements

These two phases are the foundation. Without clean, normalised install data and accurately configured entitlements, every downstream calculation is fiction.

Discovery and normalisation

SAM Pro pulls software install data into cmdb_sam_sw_install via Discovery (MID Server + probes), SCCM/Intune connectors, or agent-based collection. The normalisation engine then maps raw install strings (e.g. "Microsoft Office 365 ProPlus 2019 en-US x64") to a canonical publisher → product → edition → version hierarchy using the Software Library (Soft Library / MSRP).

Critical

If normalisation fails, the install won't reconcile. Always validate normalisation coverage, before your first reconciliation run. Use the SAM Workspace normalisation dashboard to identify publisher gaps first.

Entitlement setup

Entitlements live on the alm_license table and link to contracts (ast_contract). Each entitlement requires: a metric type (per device, per user, per processor, concurrent), effective and expiry dates, a purchased quantity, and a rights type (standard, downgrade, upgrade, cross-edition). Blank expiry dates are the #1 cause of renewal alerts never firing - always enforce these during import.

Phase 3 - Reconciliation Engine

Reconciliation is the engine that drives everything downstream. It takes installs from the CMDB, matches against entitlements, applies the correct consumption metric, and produces a compliance position for each software model. 

There are exactly three possible outcomes, and each drives a completely different downstream workflow. Getting these confused is the most common source of implementation mistakes.

Phase 4a - Reclamation (Over-Licensed)

Reclamation targets software you have too much of - over-purchased entitlements, or installs sitting unused on devices. The workflow identifies candidates by last-used date, notifies users, gives them a response window, then either creates an uninstall task or logs a justified exception. Every license freed returns to the pool and directly reduces your renewal quantity.

Common failure point

Reclamation notifications silently fail when the last-used date field isn't populated by your discovery source. If SCCM metering data isn't flowing through, SAM Pro has no inactivity basis. Verify metering data end-to-end before enabling the workflow - check that the SCCM SGC jobs are active and the data source SQL fields are correctly configured.

Phase 4b - Remediation (Under-Licensed)

Remediation addresses the opposite problem: you've deployed more than you own. SAM Pro calculates the shortfall and presents three remediation paths. Each path generates a tracked task - with an assigned owner, due date, and SLA - and compliance is restored automatically on the next reconciliation run once the action is complete.

The Three Rs - Quick Reference

These three terms are the most frequently confused in SAM Pro implementations. Here's the definitive comparison:

Phase 5 - Contract Renewal

The renewal phase is where all the upstream work pays off. Your reconciliation position - cleaned by reclamation and remediation - becomes the evidence base for your publisher negotiation. SAM Pro drives renewal through three mechanisms:

Renewal notifications

Configured on the ast_contract record. Set a threshold (typically 90 days before expiry) and SAM Pro notifies the contract owner. The #1 failure point: blank End date fields. Contracts imported from spreadsheets routinely arrive with no expiry date - no end date means no notification, ever. Build a data quality check into every contract import.

Renewal decision workflow

The reconciliation position directly informs renewal quantity. Carrying 200 unused seats? Reduce at renewal. Under-licensed by 50? Add at renewal. This data loop is what transforms SAM Pro from a compliance tool into a procurement optimisation engine.

Contract record update

Once the renewal is signed, update the ast_contract record with new start/end dates, revised quantities, and updated cost. The linked alm_license entitlement records update accordingly. The next reconciliation run immediately reflects the new position -  and the cycle restarts from Phase 1.

Common Gotchas in Every Implementation

• Normalisation must precede reconciliation. Unnormalized installs are simply ignored by the engine. Check normalisation coverage in the SAM Workspace before your first reconciliation run.
• Metric type mismatches produce meaningless compliance positions. If the entitlement says "per device" but the publisher charges "per user," your numbers are wrong. This is especially painful for Microsoft 365, Adobe CC, and Oracle. Validate metric types during every entitlement import.
• Reclamation notifications fail silently without usage data. SCCM must be passing metering data or the last-used date field is never populated. Confirm metering flow end-to-end - check that the SGC scheduled jobs are active and the SQL connection fields aren't blank.
• Blank contract end dates kill renewal alerting entirely. This is the single most common data quality issue in entitlement imports. Enforce end date as a mandatory field in your import transform map.
• The three Rs must run in sequence. Reconciliation first → position identified → reclamation and remediation in parallel → renewal uses the cleaned position. Skipping or reordering steps means each phase operates on stale or incorrect data.

Regards,

Abhishek Singh

ITAM Principal Solution Architect

https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhishek-singh786/