DAN AARON POLSTER, District Judge.
Before the Court is Defendants' Motion to Dismiss Plaintiff's Complaint, or in the Alternative, Compel Arbitration ("Motion" or "Motion to Dismiss").
On January 7, 2019, Plaintiff Lineker Kammer, on behalf of Kammer Solutions, executed a document entitled "Installer Independent Contractor Agreement" with Justin Carter on behalf of an entity named LeafFilter North, Inc. Doc #: 7-3. In addition to the Agreement's title, the text makes clear that Kammer Solutions is an independent contractor.
On August 15, 2019, Plaintiff filed a putative collective and class action complaint against Leaffilter North, LLC and Leaffilter North of Massachusetts, LLC (collectively, "Leaffilter North") asserting an FLSA claim and three state-law claims. Doc #: 1. Plaintiff alleges that he was an employee of LeafFilter, LLC who worked 70 hours per week during his 6-month stint, but was only paid for 40 hours of work per week. Id. Without mentioning the Installer Independent Contractor Agreement or its arbitration provision, Plaintiff asserts that Leaffilter North misclassified him as an independent contractor when he was in fact treated like an employee, and proceeds to explain ad nauseum why LeafFilter North was in fact his employer.
On September 16, 2019, LeafFilter North, LLC filed the pending Motion to Dismiss. Doc #: 7. Attached to the Motion is the aforementioned Installer Independent Contractor Agreement which, LeafFilter North contends, requires the parties to submit their disputes to arbitration and restricts independent contractors to bringing only ability to bringing only individual actions. LeafFilter North states that Plaintiff Lineker Kammer is not a proper plaintiff because the Agreement was made between it and Kammer Solutions, an independent contractor. Supporting this assertion, it has attached 3 documents showing that Kammer Solutions was indeed an entity at the time the Agreement was executed. Doc ##: 7-4 (Liability Insurance Certificate), 7-5 (Workers Comp Insurance Proposal), and 7-6 (Requesting Taxpayer ID for Kammer Solutions).
On October 30, 2019, Plaintiff filed an Opposition Brief arguing that LeafFilter's reliance upon the Installer Independent Contractor Agreement "is inappropriate at the motion to dismiss phase." Doc #: 11 at 2. Actually, it was disingenuous of Plaintiff
Whether this Agreement (and, thus, its arbitration provision) is valid is a threshold issue that must be resolved before determining whether or not LeafFilter North was really an employer and Plaintiff was really its employee — a fact question requiring discovery and the employment of a multi-factored economic-reality test. There is a national policy favoring arbitration, and the question of whether a contract containing an arbitration provision is valid is a question for an arbitrator, not the court. Buckeye Check Cashing, Inc. V. Cardegna, 546 U.S. 440 (2006). Accordingly, the Court hereby dismisses this case without prejudice in favor of arbitration.