In this paper, we consider optimum plan to determine stress change times under the three-step stress PALTs, assuming that each test units follows an exponential distribution. The tampered random variable(TRV) model for the three-step stress PALTs setup are introduced, and maximum likelihood estimators(MLEs) of the failure rate and the acceleration factors are obtained. The change times to minimize the generalized asymptotic variance(GAVR) of MLEs of the failure rate and the acceleration factors are proposed for the three-step stress PALTs.