Ask a Minnesota lawyer whether a claim is worth bringing and you will get an answer about the merits. Ask them whether it will actually get brought, and you will get an answer about fees.
Those are different questions, and the second one is decided almost entirely by the Legislature.
Minnesota’s default is the American rule: each side pays its own lawyer. Against that background, the Legislature has carved out a scattered set of exceptions — some one-directional, some two-directional, one mandatory, one capped at five dollars. Laid side by side, those exceptions form a map. And the map is not organized around how serious the underlying wrong is.
It is organized around who the Legislature thought could not otherwise afford a lawyer.
The one-way shifts: fees run to the claimant only
These are the provisions that make small claims viable, because they change the arithmetic for exactly one side.
Wage claims — and this one is mandatory. Minn. Stat. § 181.171, subd. 3:
In an action brought under subdivision 1, the court shall order an employer who is found to have committed a violation to pay to the aggrieved party reasonable costs, disbursements, witness fees, and attorney fees.
Shall, not may. Subdivision 1’s list reaches §§ 181.13 and 181.14, the final-paycheck provisions we covered here. A $2,800 commission dispute is not a $2,800 dispute once that sentence attaches.
The minimum wage and overtime track is the same. Minn. Stat. § 177.27, subd. 10: “In any action brought pursuant to subdivision 8, the court shall order an employer who is found to have committed a violation or violations of sections 177.21 to 177.44 or 181.165 to pay to the employee or employees reasonable costs, disbursements, witness fees, and attorney fees.”
Non-competes run one way by design. Under Minn. Stat. § 181.988, the fee provision appears twice — at subd. 2(d) for a voidness claim and subd. 3(c) for a choice-of-law claim — and in both places the award runs to the employee, never the employer, and is discretionary (“may”). An employer that loses pays; an employer that wins simply wins.
Consumers under the Consumer Fraud Act. Minn. Stat. § 325F.70, subd. 3(a) lets a consumer “recover damages, together with costs and disbursements, including costs of investigation and reasonable attorney fees,” and then adds the sentence that removes the usual threshold fight: “An action brought under this section benefits the public.”
Books and records. Minn. Stat. § 302A.461, subd. 4(e) authorizes a court to “specifically enforce this section and award expenses, including attorney fees and disbursements,” to the shareholder — not to the corporation. We wrote about that remedy here.
Notice what these have in common. Each involves a claimant whose individual loss is small relative to the cost of proving it, facing a defendant for whom the same litigation is a rounding error. The fee provision is not a bonus. It is the only thing that makes the claim exist.
The two-way shifts: fees run to whoever wins, and that changes everything
A two-directional fee provision does not make claims viable. It makes them expensive to bring badly.
Trade secrets. Minn. Stat. § 325C.04:
If (i) a claim of misappropriation is made in bad faith, (ii) a motion to terminate an injunction is made or resisted in bad faith, or (iii) willful and malicious misappropriation exists, the court may award reasonable attorney’s fees to the prevailing party.
Read clause (i) from a defendant’s side. A former employer that sues a departing employee on a thin misappropriation theory is not merely risking a loss — it is exposed on fees. That is a real deterrent, and it is why trade secret demand letters and trade secret complaints are different documents. See our trade secrets guide.
Deceptive trade practices. Minn. Stat. § 325D.45, subd. 2 allocates costs to the prevailing party “unless the court otherwise directs,” but permits attorney fees only in two narrow situations: where the complaining party “has brought an action knowing it to be groundless,” or where the party charged “has willfully engaged in the trade practice knowing it to be deceptive.” Both ends are scienter-gated. The result is a statute that rarely shifts fees at all — which is one reason the Deceptive Trade Practices Act functions mainly as an injunction statute, as we discussed here.
The mandatory shift nobody expects: construction prompt payment
Minn. Stat. § 337.10, subd. 3 is the most aggressive fee provision in this survey, and it sits in a statute most people read only for its voided clauses:
A party requesting payment who prevails in a civil action to collect interest penalties from a party responsible for payment must be awarded its costs and disbursements, including attorney fees incurred in bringing the action.
“Must be awarded.” Paired with 1-1/2 percent per month on undisputed amounts and a statutory right to suspend work, that provision does something unusual: it makes a small claim — unpaid interest penalties, not the underlying invoice — worth filing on its own. We covered the whole architecture here.
The general-purpose shift, and its gate
Minn. Stat. § 8.31, subd. 3a is Minnesota’s broadest fee provision: any person injured by a violation of the laws listed in subd. 1 “may bring a civil action and recover damages, together with costs and disbursements, including costs of investigation and reasonable attorney’s fees.”
But it is gated. In Ly v. Nystrom, 615 N.W.2d 302 (Minn. 2000), the Minnesota Supreme Court held the remedy available only to claimants who demonstrate that their cause of action benefits the public, reasoning from the Attorney General’s own authority: “If the attorney general is not authorized to commence a proceeding because it would not result in a public benefit … then a claimant under the Private AG Statute is similarly constrained.”
And the list in subd. 1 is narrower than people assume. It names the Unlawful Trade Practices Act at §§ 325D.09 to 325D.16. It does not name the Deceptive Trade Practices Act at §§ 325D.43 to 325D.48. Full treatment here.
And then there is the fee Minnesota deliberately capped
Minn. Stat. § 504B.291, subd. 1(a) lets a tenant in a nonpayment eviction redeem the tenancy by paying the arrears “with interest, costs of the action, and an attorney’s fee not to exceed $5.”
Five dollars. In a proceeding where the landlord has retained counsel, filed, served, and appeared.
That number is not an oversight anyone forgot to update. It is a design choice pointing the opposite direction from every other provision on this page: Minnesota did not want the cost of the lawyer to be what prevents a tenant from curing. Where the other statutes shift fees to make a claim possible, this one caps fees to keep a cure affordable. See our eviction timeline.
The map
| Claim | Direction | Discretionary? | Practical effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wage payment § 181.171, subd. 3 | To the employee | Mandatory (“shall”) | Makes four-figure wage claims economically real |
| Minimum wage / overtime § 177.27, subd. 10 | To the employee | Mandatory | Same |
| Construction prompt payment § 337.10, subd. 3 | To the party requesting payment | Mandatory (“must be awarded”) | Makes an interest-penalty claim worth filing alone |
| Consumer Fraud Act § 325F.70, subd. 3 | To the consumer | Available by statute | Damages plus costs of investigation, public benefit deemed |
| Non-compete § 181.988, subds. 2(d), 3(c) | To the employee only | Discretionary (“may”) | Employer wins get nothing |
| Books and records § 302A.461, subd. 4(e) | To the shareholder | Discretionary | Deters stonewalling a first-tier demand |
| Private attorney general § 8.31, subd. 3a | To the injured person | Available, but public-benefit gated | Broad reach, narrow gate |
| Trade secrets § 325C.04 | Either party | Discretionary, scienter-gated | Deters weak claims as well as bad conduct |
| Deceptive trade practices § 325D.45, subd. 2 | Either party | Discretionary, scienter-gated both ways | Rarely shifts; costs still follow the prevailing party |
| Eviction redemption § 504B.291, subd. 1(a) | To the landlord | Capped at $5 | Keeps the cure cheap on purpose |
What this means when you are deciding whether to bring a claim
- Find the fee provision before you value the case. A $9,000 claim with a mandatory one-way fee shift and a $9,000 claim without one are different assets, and they settle at very different numbers.
- Read the direction. One-way to the claimant means the defendant’s downside is asymmetric — which is leverage. Two-way means your own downside is real, and a thin theory is now a priced risk.
- Stack where you legitimately can. Independent fee-shifting statutes reaching the same conduct compound, and stacking is what changes a defendant’s posture. A fraudulent account, for instance, can implicate the Fair Credit Reporting Act’s own fee provisions at 15 U.S.C. §§ 1681n and 1681o alongside state-law theories — see our identity theft guide.
- Check whether “shall” or “may” appears. It is the difference between a certainty you can price and an argument you have to win twice.
- Do not assume a fee provision follows the statute you are suing under. Section 8.31, subd. 1’s list is specific, and a statute’s absence from it is dispositive.
- Watch the clock separately. Fee provisions do not extend limitations periods — see our Minnesota limitations overview.
If you are defending one
- Identify the exposure on day one. In a mandatory-fee case, the fee award frequently exceeds the damages, and it grows every month the case is open. That fact should drive the early settlement posture, not the merits assessment alone.
- Look for a two-way provision. If the statute cuts both ways, a groundless claim is a counter-lever, and saying so early is cheaper than proving it late.
- Tender what is genuinely owed. Several Minnesota statutes reward it explicitly — Minn. Stat. § 181.14, subd. 3 caps exposure at a good-faith legal tender, which is the single most under-used defensive provision in the employment chapter.
The observation
We tell ourselves that the law prioritizes the wrongs it considers most serious. Look at this map and that is plainly not what happened.
A construction subcontractor chasing an interest penalty gets a mandatory fee award. A shareholder frozen out of the company’s own books gets a discretionary one. A consumer defrauded in a household purchase gets damages, investigation costs, and fees, with the public-benefit question answered by statute. And a business defrauded in the purchase of that same business gets Ly v. Nystrom and the American rule.
The variable is not culpability. It is bargaining power at the moment the claim arises. Every one of these provisions exists because the Legislature concluded that a particular category of claimant would otherwise be structurally unable to hire a lawyer — and, in the eviction statute, that a particular category of defendant would be unable to cure if the lawyer’s bill came with it.
That is a defensible way to build a code. But it means the practical question in Minnesota is rarely was I wronged. It is which chapter is my wrong in — because that, more than the facts, determines whether anyone will take the case.
Madgett Law, LLC evaluates Minnesota claims and defenses with the fee-shifting architecture front and center, on both sides — for claimants deciding whether a case can be brought, and for businesses assessing exposure that grows every month a mandatory-fee case stays open. Send us a message or call 612-470-6529.
Sources: Minn. Stat. § 8.31, subd. 1 (laws the attorney general is directed to investigate, naming the Prevention of Consumer Fraud Act at §§ 325F.68 to 325F.70 and the Unlawful Trade Practices Act at §§ 325D.09 to 325D.16) and subd. 3a (private remedies; damages, costs and disbursements, costs of investigation, and reasonable attorney’s fees); Minn. Stat. § 325F.70, subd. 3(a) (consumer action for damages, costs of investigation, and reasonable attorney fees, and the declaration that the action benefits the public); Minn. Stat. § 325D.45, subd. 2 (costs to the prevailing party; attorney fees only for a groundless action or a willful, knowing deceptive practice); Minn. Stat. § 325C.04 (attorney’s fees to the prevailing party on bad-faith claim, bad-faith injunction motion, or willful and malicious misappropriation); Minn. Stat. § 181.171, subds. 1 and 3 (private civil actions and mandatory costs, disbursements, witness fees, and attorney fees); Minn. Stat. § 177.27, subds. 8 and 10 (private actions and mandatory fees); Minn. Stat. § 181.988, subds. 2(d) and 3(c) (discretionary attorney fees to the employee); Minn. Stat. § 181.14, subd. 3 (good-faith legal tender); Minn. Stat. § 302A.461, subd. 4(e) (specific enforcement and expenses including attorney fees and disbursements); Minn. Stat. § 337.10, subd. 3 (prompt payment; mandatory costs and disbursements including attorney fees to a prevailing claimant); Minn. Stat. § 504B.291, subd. 1(a) (redemption on payment of arrears with interest, costs, and an attorney’s fee not to exceed $5) (Minnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes); 15 U.S.C. §§ 1681n, 1681o; Ly v. Nystrom, 615 N.W.2d 302 (Minn. 2000) (public benefit requirement under Minn. Stat. § 8.31, subd. 3a) (opinion text retrieved from the Caselaw Access Project archive of North Western Reporter, Second Series, volume 615, at pages 302–316). This survey is not exhaustive; Minnesota contains fee provisions beyond those discussed here, and contractual fee provisions operate independently. This article is general legal information about Minnesota law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney–client relationship. No outcome is promised or implied.