This article was displayed on the ChosunBiz RM Report site at 2:05 p.m. on Apr. 1, 2026.
Accountants, once called the "guardians of capitalism" and the "flower of the professions," are wavering. It is the result of a feedback loop in which overwork repeats and becomes entrenched every audit season. The practice of reducing recorded work hours, known as "time-eating," is also rampant. We examined conditions on the ground through testimony and surveys from about 200 current and former accounting-industry workers. [Editor's note]
Current and former employees at accounting firms pointed to the standard audit hours system as the backdrop for a vicious cycle of low-priced engagements leading to heavy workloads. Standard audit hours refer to the minimum audit time set to maintain the quality of audits of corporate accounting.
The problem is that this minimum threshold effectively works as a "ceiling" in the bidding process for audit contracts. Accountants said contracts are signed for fewer hours than actually needed, locking in a structure where fees shrink and workloads grow.
◇Hourly audit fees fall by more than 20%
On the 1st, ChosunBiz analyzed 2025 audit fees for the 15 largest listed companies by market capitalization and found that seven companies showed declines from a year earlier. Three were unchanged, and five increased.
Celltrion's audit fee fell about 21%, from 2.92 billion won in 2024 to 2.3 billion won in 2025. Samsung C&T also decreased about 6% over the same period, from 4.254 billion won to 3.97 billion won.
Audit fees are usually determined by "audit hours invested × hourly rate." Recently, cases in which audit hours have been reduced, resulting in lower fees, have increased. According to the Financial Services Commission, the average audit hours invested for listed companies decreased for the fourth straight year, from 2,458 hours in 2022 to 2,348 hours last year.
Hourly rates also often retreated. Hanwha Aerospace paid 1.173 billion won in audit fees last year. With 14,533 audit hours, the hourly rate was 80,712 won. That was down 20.97% (21,417 won) from 2024's 102,129 won.
SK Square's hourly rate also fell 11.24% (12,578 won), from 111,956 won in 2024 to 99,378 won last year.
◇Minimum threshold becomes the ceiling
Accountants cite the standard audit hours system as the backdrop for this trend. The system was introduced after the large-scale accounting fraud scandal at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering in 2016. Its core is to set the minimum hours that must be audited based on a company's size, number of affiliates, industry, and other factors.
Standard audit hours are adjusted every three years by a review committee, and the criteria were recently lowered on grounds that the corporate burden was excessive. In addition, if internal controls over financial reporting and financial statements are audited simultaneously, or if digital technology is used, the standard can be reduced further.
The problem is that as standard audit hours have been lowered, the gap has widened with the time actually needed for audits. An executive at a major accounting firm said, "In general, the actual audit hours performed far exceed the standard audit hours," and added, "We sometimes include a clause in the audit contract allowing us to request additional fees from the client company, but as the party in the weaker position, an accounting firm finds it hard to actually ask."
Although standard audit hours are only a minimum, accounting firms that must win contracts from companies find it difficult to ask for more than the standard. Accountant A said, "For sales reasons, contracts are sometimes made as if fewer hours than actually needed can be invested."
This reality becomes clear when moving from designation-based engagements, in which the financial authorities designate the auditor, to free engagements, in which accounting firms win the audit contract through competitive bidding.
Kia received designated audits by Samjong Accounting Firm through 2024, then switched to a free engagement in 2025 and appointed EY Hanyoung. Audit fees and hours fell from 2.59 billion won and 23,378 hours in 2024 to 1.85 billion won and 20,034 hours in 2025. Audit fees decreased about 28.6%, and audit hours decreased about 14.3%.
There are also cases where audit fees fall when the same accounting firm takes on a company's audit consecutively. The reason given is that know-how accumulates with consecutive audits.
◇Authorities vow "tighter oversight"… skepticism on the ground
When a firm wins a low-priced engagement that falls short of the hours actually needed, the burden is shifted to the field. Accounting firms respond by cutting staff or increasing the share of junior staff to meet costs.
Accountant B at a major accounting firm said, "As fees declined, firms tried to lower costs, which created a structure in which the workload each person must handle increases."
In this process, the practice of recording fewer hours than actually worked, or "time-eating," also becomes taken for granted. Working hours are underreported to match the contracted audit hours.
Accountant C said, "If we record working hours truthfully, audit fees will swell, so those higher up who won the contract can't help but pressure us to record fewer hours." In effect, it is a vicious cycle of low-priced engagements → staff cuts → heavier workloads → reduced time records.
The Financial Services Commission announced plans to step up oversight in connection with the problem of audit hours being reduced due to competition among accounting firms. However, it says that because circumstances differ by company, it is difficult to define shoddy audits based on hours invested alone. The Korea Institute of Certified Public Accountants also plans to check on-site difficulties through roundtables and propose system improvements.
But critics at the scene say the response was late. After two accountants in their 30s died within three months at a major accounting firm recently, discussions on countermeasures began belatedly. One accountant said, "The problem of (accounting firms') cutthroat competition is nothing new, but it is heartbreaking that action happens only after people die."