Olson et al v. LTF Club Management Company, Inc.

Filing 89

ORDER-WRITTEN Opinion entered by the Honorable Philip G. Reinhard on 4/7/2017: For the reasons stated below, defendant's motion 59 to dismiss Count III and Count IV is granted. Counts III and IV are dismissed with prejudice. The motion to dis miss Count II as to Johnson, to the extent defendant is still pursuing it, is denied. Count I and II remain pending as to the remaining plaintiffs. The parties are directed to contact Magistrate Judge Johnston within thirty days of the entry of this order to discuss whether a renewed settlement conference or mediation might be fruitful. [see STATEMENT-OPINION] Signed by the Honorable Philip G. Reinhard on 4/7/2017. Mailed notice (kms)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
WESTERN DIVISION
Sandra Olson, et al.,

)
)
Plaintiffs,
)
)
vs.
)
)
LTF Club Management Company, LLC, et al., )
)
Defendant.
)

Case No. 16 C 01179

Judge Philip G. Reinhard

ORDER
For the reasons stated below, defendant’s motion [59] to dismiss Count III and Count IV
is granted. Counts III and IV are dismissed with prejudice. The motion to dismiss Count II as to
Johnson, to the extent defendant is still pursuing it, is denied. Count I and II remain pending as
to the remaining plaintiffs. The parties are directed to contact Magistrate Judge Johnston within
thirty days of the entry of this order to discuss whether a renewed settlement conference or
mediation might be fruitful.
STATEMENT-OPINION
Defendant, LTF Management Company, LLC, moves [59] to dismiss Counts III
(violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) and IV (breach of contract concerning
unpaid training) of the third amended complaint of plaintiffs, Sandra Olson1, Melissa Woodall,
Lindsey Johnson, Jennifer Knop, and Suzanne Treadwell.2 In a previous order [56], the court

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Olson makes no claims under Counts III and IV which are the subject of the motion to dismiss.

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Toni Lemberg, Randi Makara, Beth Rogala, and Allison Seubert were also plaintiffs in this
action but they have settled with defendant and their claims have been dismissed with prejudice [88]. The
motion to dismiss [59] was initially filed as to the second amended complaint. Plaintiffs were given leave
to file a third amended complaint and defendant’s motion to dismiss was allowed to stand as to the third
amended complaint [76]. The portion of defendant’s motion directed at the Count I claim of plaintiff
Lindsey Johnson was withdrawn [76]. Defendant’s motion also sought to dismiss Lindsey Johnson’s
Count II claim. While this attack on Johnson’s Count II claim was not withdrawn, defendant makes no
argument in its reply brief as to Johnson’s Count II claim. The third amended complaint’s allegations as
to when Johnson learned of the institution of shop charges appears to cure the defect relied on by
defendant in attacking Johnson’s Count II claim as it cured the defect in the Count I claim. Therefore,
only Counts III and IV are subject to the motion to dismiss.

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dismissed the claims in Counts III and IV of the corrected first amended complaint [37] without
prejudice for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6).
Count IV of the pending third amended complaint is identical to the previously dismissed
Count IV of the corrected first amended complaint. Both alleged that the nature of the
employment agreements between plaintiffs and defendant was that plaintiffs would be paid at
least minimum wage for training time. They allege, on information and belief, that various
managers “informed and assured the Plaintiffs that they would be paid for training time.”
In its previous order the court stated:
Plaintiffs’ Count IV does not allege “enough facts to state a claim to relief that is
plausible on its face.” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007). In
order to be plausible, plaintiffs need to provide facts to show that someone from
defendant actually promised them before they underwent the training that they would be
paid for doing so. As currently alleged, plaintiffs say only that some unidentified
managers at some unspecified time informed them they would be paid for the training.
The complaint does not say if this occurred before or after the training or after some of
the training but before other training. There is no allegation from which an offer of
payment to undergo the training can be inferred. Without allegations to support an offer
and acceptance, no contract to pay for training has been pled. See Wigod v. Wells Fargo
Bank, N.A., 673 F.3d 547, 560 (7th Cir. 2012).
Because plaintiffs have not corrected this pleading defect but have simply repeated it, Count IV
must be dismissed.
Count III, the FLSA claim, is also essentially identical to the one previously dismissed.
As to the plaintiffs who remain in the case, the only new allegation is as follows: “JENNIFER
KNOP remembers training happening at random times a year for approximately 3 hours a year
for 11 years.” This additional allegation does not correct the pleading deficiency which led to
Count III of the corrected first amended complaint being dismissed. In the first place, this
allegation only goes to Knop. No additional allegations are made as to Woodall, Johnson or
Treadwell. The allegations as to them remain the same as those found deficient in the corrected
first amended complaint. As to Knop, the new allegation does not provide enough information
to state a plausible claim.
In its prior order the court stated:
The weight of authority holds that the “FLSA does not provide a remedy for workers who
have received at least the minimum wage for a pay period in which they have not worked
overtime.” Brown v. Lululemon Athletica, Inc., No. 10 C 5672, 2011 WL 741254 * 4
(N.D. Ill. Feb. 24, 2011) (St. Eve, J.) (collecting cases). Plaintiffs allege they performed
mandatory training outside their regular working hours and that the training was done
online when they were not otherwise able to perform compensable work. They do not
allege that this caused them to work overtime. They only allege “on information and

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belief” that their unpaid training hours and the hours they worked for which they were
paid, when combined, resulted in them being paid less than the minimum wage.
A plaintiff must provide “enough detail to give the defendant fair notice of what the
claim is and the grounds upon which it rests and, through his allegations, show that it is
plausible, rather than merely speculative, that he is entitled to relief.” Tamayo v.
Blagojevich, 526 F.3d 1074, 1083 (7th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks and citation
omitted). Plaintiffs allege they performed mandatory online training outside their regular
work hours and “on information and belief” that the unpaid training hours when
combined with their paid hours resulted in them being paid less than minimum wage.
This does not give defendant fair notice of the grounds upon which the claim rests. The
complaint does not identify any weeks in which any of the plaintiffs were paid less than
the minimum wage due to the mandatory training. It does not identify any weeks in
which any of the plaintiffs performed any of the mandatory training. Plaintiffs were all
paid on commission but the complaint contains no information as to how much any of
them was paid in any week at any time. As pled, defendant is left to guess as to when
plaintiffs claim they were underpaid and how much the underpayment is claimed to be.
While precision is not required, plaintiffs’ allegations do not provide any information
about their claims beyond saying, in effect, sometimes we did this training and we also
worked regular hours and we think that sometimes this must have resulted in us being
paid less than the minimum wage. Plaintiffs allege no more than a guess and such
speculation is insufficient to give defendant fair notice of what plaintiffs’ claims actually
are.
The allegation that Knop “remembers training happening at random times a year for
approximately 3 hours a year for 11 years” does nothing to identify any week in which she was
paid less than minimum wage. She has not given defendant fair notice of what her claim
actually is.
For the foregoing reasons, defendant’s motion [59] to dismiss Count III and Count IV is
granted. Counts III and IV are dismissed with prejudice. The motion to dismiss Count II as to
Johnson, to the extent defendant is still pursuing it, is denied. Count I and II remain pending as
to the remaining plaintiffs. The parties are directed to contact Magistrate Judge Johnston within
thirty days of the entry of this order to discuss whether a renewed settlement conference or
mediation might be fruitful.
Date: 4/07/2017

ENTER:

___________________________________
United States District Court Judge
Electronic Notices. (LC)

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