Should scheduled jobs go through a queue

If a job can be late, a queue; if it must run at a wall-clock time, a scheduler. Mixing them produces the worst outcome: a cron entry that enqueues work which then sits behind a backlog, so the job runs on time and executes hours later.

Flags for anything longer than a few days. A branch that lives two weeks becomes a merge event; a flag makes the same work a series of small changes. The cost is discipline about removing flags, which is the part every team underestimates.

The comparison that matters is not price per month:

Self-hosting wins on invoice and loses on the hours you cannot schedule. Below one full-time operator, managed is usually cheaper in the currency that runs out first.