EAST ST. LOUIS • Two exotic dancers for the PT’s chain of strip clubs are trying to get approval for a class action lawsuit to represent hundreds of colleagues who may feel cheated on a decade’s worth of compensation.The suit, filed in federal court here Jan. 31 by Missouri residents Brandy Apple and Amanda E. Sheer, says that dancers at PT’s and other clubs owned by VCG Holding Corp. receive no hourly wages and depend solely upon tips from “table, chair, couch, lap and/or VIP room dances.” The suit also says they are forced to share their tips with managers, disc jockeys and other employees.The complaint alleges that the arrangement boosts the company bottom line at the expense of the dancers, violates the law and is contrary to the “vast majority” of past lawsuits over the issue, in which courts have found dancers must be paid a minimum wage. VCG, based in Colorado, declined to comment on the suit. Its website lists ownership of PT’s Sports and the Penthouse Club in Sauget, PT’s and Roxy’s in Brooklyn and PT’s in Centreville. It also has clubs in five other states.The suit says no legal exceptions apply that would allow VCG to pay dancers this way. The dancers are not professionals nor artists and the dancing does not require “invention, imagination or talent in a recognized field of artistic endeavor,” the filing says.“Plaintiffs, like all other dancers, do not have the opportunity to exercise the business skills and initiative necessary to elevate their status to that of independent contractors,” the suit says.There is no training and only a minimum level of skill is required, the suit says.Dancers’ only control is what to wear, within a range set by the company, and how provocatively to dance.Tips cannot be used offset the required minimum wage, the suit complains, unless employees keep all the money.The class action could consist of as many as 300 women who have worked at the clubs in the past decade; 20 to 40 women work for each club each day, according to the lawsuit.