In today's world, almost every individual uses computational machines for their day to day activities. Contribution of Cloud Computing in our day to day life is commendable. Even a common man has the privilege to use cloud services in the form of email, games, storage and etc., because of Cloud Computing. Cloud services tend to be cheaper and affordable with pay as you use policy. Scalability and on demand service is an added advantage of cloud computing. With all its benefits and simplicity in usage, clouds have earned a huge number of customers. While the growth of cloud computing looks healthy, several issues like security, cloud outages and expenses compel an user to think and analyze before converting to cloud services. This paper discusses about the hidden costs incurred by using closed source cloud services and the advantages of using open source cloud platforms available in the market. © 2015 IEEE.