3 Ways To Force Your Insurance Company To Pay Up, According to Vivian Tu
Health insurance companies deny one out of every five claims. Most people accept that denial and move on.
According to Vivian Tu — known as "Your Rich BFF" — that's exactly what insurers are counting on. In a YouTube video, she broke down what most people don't know: you can fight back and the odds are actually in your favor when you do.
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Find out exactly what you need to know below.
Know That You Have the Right To Appeal — Always
The single most important thing Tu wants people to understand is that a denial is not a final answer. It's an opening position. Every health insurance plan sold in the United States is required to have an appeals process and using it is your legal right regardless of the reason for denial.
Less than 1% of people who receive a claim denial actually appeal. That number alone explains a lot about why insurers deny so freely. The calculus is simple: most people give up, which means the denial costs the insurance company nothing. The moment you file an appeal, you become the rare exception — and the odds shift meaningfully in your direction.
Use an AI Tool To Write the Appeal Letter
Tu's specific recommendation is a free AI tool called Claimable, which she flagged as genuinely useful and not a paid partnership. The process is straightforward: upload your denial letter and health insurance information, answer a set of questions about your situation and the system generates a professional appeal letter written in the kind of language that signals you know what you're doing. Tu described it as what you'd get if a lawyer and a doctor teamed up to write on your behalf.
Of the people who appeal using Claimable, more than 80% succeed — a success rate that reflects both the strength of the letter format and the simple fact that insurance companies receive so few appeals that a well-constructed one gets taken seriously. The service is free in most cases. For situations that don't qualify for the no-cost option, the fee is $40 and a nonprofit partner is available for people facing financial hardship.
Escalate If the First Appeal Fails
A first-level appeal that gets denied is still not the end. Tu noted that Claimable will escalate to executives and policymakers when the situation warrants — and that escalation matters because most denials never reach anyone with actual authority to override them.
The script that tends to work at the escalation stage is direct and specific: state your name, your policy number, the claim that was denied, the date of the original denial and the date of your first appeal. Then ask specifically to speak with a supervisor or have your case reviewed at the executive level. Use the phrase "external review" — in most states, you have the legal right to have a denied claim reviewed by an independent third party outside the insurance company and invoking that right explicitly often prompts faster internal resolution.
The common errors Tu said cost people the most money are accepting the first denial without appealing, missing the appeal deadline printed on the denial letter and submitting appeals without supporting documentation from the treating physician. A letter from your doctor stating medical necessity in specific clinical language — not just "my patient needs this" but "this treatment is medically necessary based on diagnosis X and is consistent with standard of care guidelines" — dramatically strengthens any appeal.
The bottom line: Insurers are betting you won't fight. The data on appeal success rates suggests that most of the time, fighting is worth it.
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This article was provided by MoneyLion.com for informational purposes only and should not be construed as financial, legal or tax advice.
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