KPMG staff face overtime checks as DOL tightens exemption rules

Long weeks in audit, tax and advisory do not automatically mean overtime pay. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, most covered workers are owed time-and-one-half for hours above 40 in a workweek unless an exemption applies, and the Labor Department says white-collar exemptions only count when both the salary test and the duties test are met.

That matters because title alone does not settle the question. The department’s guidance says professional employees must work in a recognized professional field, and the learned-professional rule says the job must require advanced knowledge customarily gained through a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction. In plain terms, a salaried badge and a business-card title are not enough if the actual job duties do not fit the exemption.

The Labor Department tightened the stakes on April 26, 2024, when it issued a final rule increasing the standard salary level for exemption and the total annual compensation threshold for highly compensated employees. For firms like KPMG, where consultants, auditors, tax professionals and corporate support staff often sit inside white-collar classification rules, that makes pay reviews and job-duty reviews more important, not less.

KPMG operates in 147 countries and collectively employs more than 219,000 people, so the issue reaches far beyond one office or one busy-season team. The firm has described itself as a “people business” and says it wants to support employees on their career journey, but exemption status still turns on legal criteria, not culture messaging. For employees who assume salary alone guarantees overtime protection, the Labor Department’s framework is the reality check: duties, not assumptions, decide who gets extra pay.

The work-life pressure is not abstract. Occupational Safety and Health Administration guidance says long work hours and extended or irregular shifts can increase fatigue, stress and illness, which is exactly why exemption questions land so sharply in professional services. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics says accountants and auditors had a median annual wage of $81,680 in May 2024 and projects the occupation to grow 5% from 2024 to 2034, underscoring how large and economically important this labor pool is.

The timing also comes after KPMG cut 195 jobs in its U.S. audit division in October 2025, a little more than 2% of that staff. With headcount tighter and peak workloads still a fact of life, the difference between exempt and nonexempt status is not a technicality. It shapes who can be asked to stay late, who is paid for it, and how fair the compensation feels when the hours keep stretching.