Consumer Fin. Prot. Bureau v. ITT Educ. Servs., Inc., 1:14–cv–00292–SEB–TAB.

Citation219 F.Supp.3d 878
Decision Date06 March 2015
Docket NumberNo. 1:14–cv–00292–SEB–TAB.,1:14–cv–00292–SEB–TAB.
Parties CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU, Plaintiff, v. ITT EDUCATIONAL SERVICES, INC., Defendant.
CourtUnited States District Courts. 7th Circuit. United States District Court (Southern District of Indiana)

219 F.Supp.3d 878

CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU, Plaintiff,
v.
ITT EDUCATIONAL SERVICES, INC., Defendant.

No. 1:14–cv–00292–SEB–TAB.

United States District Court, S.D. Indiana, Indianapolis Division.

Signed March 6, 2015.


219 F.Supp.3d 884

Ethan H. Levisohn, Maureen E. McOwen, Cynthia Gooen Lesser, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Washington, DC, for Plaintiff.

Douglas R. Cox, Jason J. Mendro, Lucas C. Townsend, Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, Washington, DC, Philip A. Whistler, Thomas Eugene Mixdorf, Ice Miller LLP, Indianapolis, IN, Timothy John Hatch, Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP, Los Angeles, CA, for Defendant.

ORDER ON DEFENDANT'S MOTION TO DISMISS

SARAH EVANS BARKER, District Judge.

This cause is before the Court on Defendant ITT Educational Services, Inc.'s Motion to Dismiss [Docket No. 15], filed on April 28, 2014 pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), 12(b)(6), and 12(b)(7). For the reasons set forth below, the Motion is DENIED in part and GRANTED in part.

Factual and Procedural Background

Plaintiff Consumer Financial Protection Bureau ("the Bureau"), a United States federal agency, has brought this suit against Defendant, alleging violations of provisions of the Consumer Financial Protection Act ("CFPA"), 12 U.S.C. §§ 5531(a), 5536(a), 5564(a), & 5565, the Truth in Lending Act ("TILA"), 15 U.S.C. §§ 1601 et seq., and regulations thereunder. Because this cause is before us on a

219 F.Supp.3d 885

motion to dismiss, we consider the facts as presented by the Bureau's Complaint.

Defendant ITT Educational Services, Inc. ("ITT") is a publicly-traded, for-profit company offering post-secondary courses and degrees to students at more than 100 locations nationwide.1 ¶ 2.2 Many of ITT's students and prospective students have limited financial means3 , and ITT therefore derives much of its revenue from federal aid, including loans, secured by the students. ¶¶ 4–5. Some 80% of ITT's revenue, in fact, comes from aid granted under Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965, 20 U.S.C. §§ 1070 et seq. ("Title IV Aid"). However, a large number of students are still unable to afford full tuition to enroll at ITT even with federal assistance. To enable students to close this "tuition gap," ITT extended to many of them short-term, no-interest loans called "Temporary Credit." The Temporary Credit packages were offered to students at the beginning of an academic year, and payment was due nine months later, at the close of the school year. ¶ 6.

ITT's aggressive tactics

The Bureau alleges that ITT employed the Temporary Credit loans as an "entry point" for "pushing" students into taking out private loans when the Temporary Credit came due and students were again unable fully to afford tuition for coming school terms. ¶ 7. According to the Bureau, ITT misled students about the balance of costs and benefits associated with ITT enrollment—thus guiding them into an unmanageable financial predicament—in a number of ways.

In the first place, ITT represented to students through oral representations and advertisements that its programs greatly advanced an enrollee's career prospects and job placement rates; the Bureau alleges that these representations were exaggerated and were based on incomplete information. ¶¶ 29–33. The Bureau utilized "mystery shoppers"—young men or women presenting themselves as prospective students—who reported that ITT staff made exaggerated claims about student success, such as that graduates with associates' degrees "usually make six figures." ¶ 41. In contrast to these claims, ITT's annual disclosures in 2012 indicated that "reported annualized salaries initially following graduation averaged approximately $32,061 for the Employable Graduates in 2011." ¶ 46.4

The Bureau alleges that ITT also misleadingly represented to prospective students that its "national accreditation" placed it on par with other major educational institutions. ¶ 54. In fact, while a "national" accreditation sounds authoritative, most non-profit colleges and universities are "regionally" accredited; such institutions accept transfer credits from for-profit schools like ITT only on a case-by-case basis. ¶¶ 50–53. According to the Bureau, ITT not only created an inaccurate overall impression in this respect, but also misled some prospective students in a more specific way: one recruiter claimed

219 F.Supp.3d 886

that ITT had the same accreditation as "all other schools"; another falsely claimed that "ITT Tech is accredited by the Department of Defense." ¶ 54.

Having given prospective students an inflated notion of the standing of the school and the career benefits derived from the degrees it bestowed, the Bureau alleges that ITT's recruiting staff engaged in heavy-handed methods to convince students to enroll. These methods included frequent phone calls and in-person multimedia presentations that mystery shoppers described as overwhelming in nature. ¶¶ 56, 58–60, 62. Prospective students were encouraged to take an admission test that, in fact, was "virtually impossible to fail," but was used to give them the impression that the school had rigorous admissions standards and that their passing the test augured well for their prospects. ¶ 61. Despite the volubility of the overall sales pitch, the Bureau maintains that ITT recruiters were instructed to be vague and evasive on the question of costs; they responded to applicants' questions by stating, "I cannot tell you what your exact cost will be," or by asking, "Do you want a discount education, or a valuable one that will give you a return in the future?" ¶ 57.

Once students agreed to enroll, the Bureau alleges that ITT then switched gears, hurrying them through the enrollment and financial aid processes—so quickly that "many consumers did not know or did not understand what they signed up for." ¶ 64. Specifically, ITT required enrollees to sign an Enrollment Agreement before they could receive any information about their financial aid options or meet with financial aid staff. ¶ 66. Mystery shoppers reported being rushed through e-signatures of documents, including authorizations to request transcripts and credit check approvals without understanding the nature of the forms they were signing. ¶ 67. One mystery shopper recounted that an ITT representative forged her signature on a number of e-documents, explaining that she was "trying to help and it was the only way she could give me the test to help push me through." ¶ 72. The Bureau asserts that financial aid officers then "took control" of the process, rushing enrollees through form signatures and providing them with little detailed information; in the words of a mystery shopper, the process was "a bit overwhelming with how quickly we went through everything, and I wasn't exactly clear on everything the [staff member] was having me sign up for." ¶ 83.

Once students had completed an academic term at ITT, the time came for them to "repackage" their financial aid and loans for the next year. The Bureau alleges that ITT's financial aid staff employed aggressive tactics in seeking to repackage students, including tracking them down on campus, barring or pulling them from class, and enlisting the aid of other ITT staff such as professors. An ITT executive conceded that the school also used the threat of withholding course materials and transcripts as "leverage" to ensure that students would repackage. ¶¶ 85–87. At both the initial and repackaging stages, ITT staff encouraged students to rely on school representatives in seeing them through the process, including the use of forms that automatically populated and required only the students' signatures at the conclusion of the process. An executive stated that ITT was "essentially holding [the students'] hands"; one mystery shopper stated that a financial aid coordinator told him that he would "get more free money that I don't have to pay back if I let them take care of my paperwork."5 ¶¶ 90–92.

219 F.Supp.3d 887

The "private loans"

The Bureau's claims against ITT focus on its assertion that, having knowingly cajoled and guided students into a financial predicament in which they were already heavily invested in an ITT degree yet lacked the financial resources to complete it—with the Temporary Credit expiring and financial aid insufficient to fully cover the "tuition gap"—ITT then persuaded continuing students to take out financially irresponsible "private loans" from third-party lenders. In the Bureau's words:

ITT Financial Aid staff coerced students into taking out loans that they did not want, did not understand, or did not even realize they were getting.... ITT sought to have its students pay for the tuition gap with ostensible third-party loans because outside sources of payment could be booked as income to the company, improving its free cash flow and the appearance of its financial statements, and because outside sources of revenue helped ITT meet a requirement by the Department of Education that at least 10% of its revenue be derived from
...

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