The High ThreeThe High ThreeIf you're FLSA-exempt, your basic pay plus most premium pay can't top a fixed amount per pay period. Work past it and the extra hours are unpaid. This shows how many overtime or comp time hours you have before that happens. If you're non-exempt, it estimates your gross pay for the pay period instead.
Your SF-50 shows it in block 35 (E = exempt, N = non-exempt).
Hours beyond 40 in a workweek or 8 in a day (officially ordered or approved).
Calendar days deployed to a qualifying wildfire, prescribed fire, or severity incident away from your duty station (or at an incident-adjacent fire camp). Any part of a day counts as a full day. Not for initial response contained within 36 hours.
IRPP is limited to $9,000 a year.
Regularly scheduled work between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m.
Non-overtime hours in your regular tour, up to 8 per Sunday.
Non-overtime hours, up to 8 per holiday.
Hours in a pay status on days with authorized hazardous duty (5 CFR 550.905).
25% for most GS hazard pay, applied to your hourly basic pay. Not capped.
Standby, AUO, availability pay, or night/standby pay not listed here.
E.g., environmental differential (GW/WG).
Night, Sunday, and holiday hours are part of the hours above (regular or overtime), not extra hours. Holiday premium is on top of your regular pay for that day.
| Item | Amount | Applies to biweekly cap | Applies to annual cap |
|---|
This calculator uses the biweekly cap. The annual cap column is for reference: it applies only in emergencies or mission-critical work your agency designates, and it'll get its own calculator.
| Item | Hours | Amount | Applies to biweekly cap | Applies to annual cap |
|---|
This calculator uses the biweekly cap. The annual cap column is for reference: it applies only in emergencies or mission-critical work your agency designates, and it'll get its own calculator.
The cap. In any pay period, your basic pay plus title 5 premium pay can't exceed the greater of GS-15 step 10 for your locality or Executive Schedule level V, each turned into a biweekly amount (annual rate / 2,087 hours, rounded to the cent, times 80). In 2026 that's $7,372.80 in the Rest of U.S. and $7,559.20 where GS-15 step 10 hits the $197,200 EX-IV ceiling (DC, San Francisco, and other high-locality areas). EX-V works out to $7,088.00, which never wins inside the U.S. because no locality is below 17.06%.
What counts. Title 5 overtime (FLSA-exempt employees), comp time earned instead of that overtime, night differential, Sunday premium, holiday premium, standby, AUO, availability pay, and incident response premium pay. What doesn't: FLSA overtime for non-exempt employees and comp time earned instead of it, hazardous duty pay, environmental differentials, and anything that isn't premium pay under 5 U.S.C. 5547(a).
Exempt overtime rate. If your basic pay is at or below GS-10 step 1 for your locality, you get 1.5 times your hourly rate. Above that, you get the greater of 1.5 times the GS-10 step 1 hourly rate or your own hourly rate. That's why a GS-13 or GS-14 often gets straight time for overtime. For the GS-12/5 Rest of U.S. example, 1.5 × $32.57 = $48.86, just above the $48.61 base rate.
Comp time. For cap purposes an hour of comp time is worth the overtime pay you'd have gotten for it. So comp time doesn't get you around the cap.
Comp time for travel is different. Comp time you earn for official travel outside your regular hours (5 U.S.C. 5550b; 5 CFR 550, subpart N) doesn't count toward the biweekly or annual premium pay cap, or the aggregate pay cap (550.1409). Leave it out of this calculator. The catch: use it by the end of the 26th pay period after you earn it or you lose it, and it's never paid out in cash, not when you leave and not to survivors (550.1407, 550.1408). The only give in the deadline: your agency can extend it up to 26 more pay periods if an exigency kept you from using it, and the clock restarts if you come back from military service or a work injury. Transferring to another agency or leaving federal service forfeits it.
The annual cap. If your agency head (or OPM) decides you're doing emergency work involving a direct threat to life or property, or the agency decides your work is mission-critical, your premium pay is limited per calendar year instead of per pay period (5 CFR 550.106). The yearly limit is the biweekly cap times the pay periods in the year (26 or 27): $191,692.80 in the Rest of U.S. for 26. Standby, AUO, availability pay, and firefighter regular-tour overtime stay under the biweekly cap even then (5 CFR 550.107). It moves the ceiling around the year; it doesn't raise it. This calculator doesn't model it; an annual cap calculator is coming.
Wildland fire. Federal land-management agency employees (e.g., Forest Service) on emergency wildland fire suppression get exempt overtime at 1.5 times their own rate, and all of it is premium pay (5 U.S.C. 5542(a)(5)). Separately, a pay-cap waiver for covered fire positions sets aside the biweekly and annual caps and replaces them with a calendar-year limit on basic plus premium pay at EX-II ($228,000 in 2026). Congress extends it year by year; check with your servicing HR office that it covers you and the work. This calculator doesn't model the waiver; it shows the biweekly cap.
Incident response premium pay (IRPP). Wildland firefighters at federal land-management agencies (e.g., Forest Service) (and employees certified for incident duties) get a daily lump sum for each calendar day deployed to a qualifying incident away from their duty station or at an incident-adjacent fire camp: 450% of their hourly rate of basic pay, with locality, rounded to the cent. Above GS-10 step 10, the daily amount stops at the GS-10 step 10 figure ($190.53 in the Rest of U.S. in 2026: 4.5 × $42.34). The yearly total can't exceed $9,000. It's premium pay under 5 U.S.C. 5547(a), so it counts toward the premium pay cap (and the EX-II limit under the wildland waiver). It isn't basic pay, so it doesn't count toward your pension or high-3, and it's left out when figuring FLSA overtime. Initial response incidents contained within 36 hours don't qualify. Exempt and non-exempt firefighters both get it.
Non-exempt. FLSA overtime is the straight-time rate times your overtime hours plus half your hourly regular rate times those hours. The regular rate includes night pay, the 25% Sunday premium, and hazard pay, so those push your overtime rate up a little. FLSA overtime isn't capped. Night, Sunday, and holiday premiums still count toward the cap, but with typical non-exempt pay there's plenty of room.
Simplifications: the pay period is treated as two equal workweeks; overtime credited in quarter hours; no special salary rates, LEO rates, or GW base rates in the grade picker (type your salary); no 2-hour call-back minimums; IRPP limit uses GS-10 step 10 (GW and WG employees use their own schedule's GW-10/10 or WG-10/2 limit); no aggregate pay limit (EX-I $253,100) check; no taxes or deductions.
Rules checked Oct 24, 2026.
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