Geico Gets Exclusive With AT&T

WASHINGTON -- GEICO Direct, one of the nation's premier insurance providers, announced today it has broadened and deepened its long-standing strategic relationship with AT&T in conjunction with signing a five-year, $190 million contract for a full range of data and voice services. GEICO companies are a nationwide direct writer of auto insurance with offices around the country. The company is the largest direct marketer and fifth- largest private-passenger auto insurance group in the United States, with 5 million policyholders and 8.4 million autos insured. GEICO also is the 10th largest property/casualty insurer in the U.S.

Building on a relationship that spans more than two decades, GEICO named AT&T its exclusive provider of networking telecommunications services. Under terms of the contract, AT&T will expand its support of GEICO's customer service centers and begin providing data services previously supplied by another carrier.

"GEICO has a well-deserved reputation for being fanatical about providing excellent customer service," said Chris Rooney, head of AT&T Business Sales. "That makes GEICO a great fit with AT&T. This contract demonstrates the great relationship our companies have enjoyed over many years and solidifies our future relations."

AT&T will provide an array of dedicated and switched inbound and outbound voice and data services to support GEICO's nationwide network of call centers. GEICO offers its customers around-the-clock service, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

GEICO also receives the benefits of AT&T Resource Manager, a service that dynamically routes calls to geographically dispersed call centers to automatically balance work loads, and additional advanced features that recognize repeat callers so representatives have immediate access to customer records. The services help GEICO increase call center efficiency, improve customer service and reduce the number of lost or abandoned calls.

Additionally, through the AT&T BusinessDirect gateway portal, GEICO gains around-the-clock online access to up-to-the-minute information about the performance of its network, applications and call center utilization.

AT&T Corp.