With the embodiment of FIGS. 6 and 7, the completion of a consistency group is delayed until the free space is released from the target volume 104₂, so that unused data may be made available for other volumes in a thin provisioned environment. Further, with described embodiments, the space relations happen automatically at the copy manager of the target server using the most relevant and current information for the target volume maintained at the target server.

With the embodiment of operations in FIGS. 6 and 7, the space release operations for the target volume 104₂ are performed at the target server 200₂ after the consistency group is formed at the target volume, which is signaled by the source server 200₁ sending the create point-in-time command. In this embodiment, the space release operations may not interfere with the copying of the source tracks and is performed after the consistency group is formed so that space is released before returning complete to the source server 200₁. In an alternative embodiment, the space release operations at blocks 702, 704, 706 of FIG. 7 may be performed while the consistency group is being formed, such as while tracks from the source volume 104₁ are being copied to the target volume 104₂.