A Wisconsin manufacturer is under fire after a former employee filed a class action complaint on October 20, 2025, alleging widespread wage and hour violations that could have big implications for HR teams everywhere.

Ahlstrom NA Specialty Solutions LLC, a Connecticut-based manufacturing company with operations in Wisconsin, stands accused of shortchanging its hourly workers by shaving time off their paychecks and failing to properly calculate overtime. The lawsuit, brought by Sean Crawford, a former utility operator at the company's Kaukauna, Wisconsin facility, claims these practices have been going on for at least three years and have affected a broad group of current and former employees.

According to the complaint, Crawford alleges that Ahlstrom's electronic timekeeping system routinely rounded employees' clock-in and clock-out times to the company's benefit. Workers were expected to arrive before their scheduled shifts and start working immediately, but the company allegedly rounded their start times forward, erasing minutes of work from their records. The same thing happened at the end of shifts, with post-shift work time rounded back, leaving employees uncompensated for work performed after their scheduled end times.

The complaint doesn't stop there. Crawford also claims that Ahlstrom failed to include bonuses, incentives, and other non-discretionary payments in its calculation of overtime pay. Under federal and Wisconsin law, these types of compensation are supposed to be factored into overtime rates. By leaving them out, the suit alleges, the company shortchanged employees who worked more than 40 hours a week.