If your team is still resolving ERISA liens in-house, you're not just spending staff hours, you're risking your client's net recovery and your firm's exposure. Recovery vendors like Machinify (formerly Rawlings), Optum, and Conduent are paid on what they collect, and since McCutchen, the written plan language controls the outcome. When a firm negotiates an ERISA lien between depositions, without the plan documents in hand, the asymmetry shows up in the client's net and in the hours the firm never gets back.
ERISA liens are decided by written plan language, and recovery vendors like Machinify, Optum, and Conduent are built to capitalize on firms that never request it. Your team doesn’t have the luxury of matching their volume, get the plan documents and the leverage before you negotiate the number down.
Get the plan documents and the leverage before you negotiate the number down.
From Knudson through Sereboff, McCutchen, and Montanile — how the Supreme Court built the current framework, how to tell a self-funded plan from a fully insured one, how to use a 1024(b)(4) request for leverage, and which post-McCutchen reduction strategies still hold up.
A practical walkthrough of what McCutchen actually changed, why self-funded versus fully insured is the first question on every file, and how the 1024(b)(4) request forces recovery vendors to show their hand.
Get the complete post-webinar package: the full round table replay, the slide deck, and every question and answer from the live Q&A. Teresa Kenyon, Esq. and a panel of experts cover plan language, demand documentation, reimbursement rights, negotiation obstacles, and strategies to protect the net recovery. Available for a limited time only.
Five concrete tactics for cutting an ERISA lien: confirming funding status, using Section 1024(b)(4) requests, spotting ambiguous plan language, leveraging make-whole and common fund arguments, and raising equitable defenses where they still apply.
Synergy is the nation's largest provider of single-event healthcare lien resolution and Medicare Secondary Payer compliance for personal injury law firms. We act as an extension of the firm, removing the lien resolution administrative burden and ensuring compliance so our clients can focus on what they do best. Our team pairs deep subrogation expertise with advanced technology and industry leading customer service to deliver exceptional outcomes. With more than 300 years of combined experience across all 50 states, we have saved injury victims over $1 billion through strategic lien resolution.
Schedule a free case review. Synergy will analyze the lien, identify reduction opportunities, and give you a clear path forward.
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