GEICO Names Jess Reed CIO; Announces Officer Appointments

WASHINGTON, May 16, 2003 -- GEICO's board of directors announced yesterday the promotions of Jess Reed to group vice president and chief information officer, Joe Thomas to vice president, Jan Stewart to corporate secretary and assistant vice president, and Rich Guertin to assistant vice president, effective immediately

Jess Reed heads GEICO's systems operations and information services, including Internet systems, mainframe and client server operations, telecommunication systems, systems security, automated print/mail services, application development and enterprise systems.

"These are critical areas for GEICO to be a leading provider of auto insurance in the U.S.," said Executive Vice President Bill Roberts. "Under Jess's leadership we have made strides to improve our performance, positioned ourselves for additional growth and looked for ways to improve the efficiency of our IT systems and applications."

Reed joined the company in 1974 as a performance analyst. He subsequently served as project analyst, planning analyst and director of telecommunications before being named assistant vice president in 1988. He became vice president of information services and systems operations in 1998. Reed holds a B.S. degree in business administration from Shepherd College in West Virginia, and an M.B.A. from Mount Saint Mary's College in Maryland.

Joe Thomas heads GEICO's customer service center in Virginia Beach, Va. Before assuming those duties as an assistant vice president in 2002, Thomas headed underwriting operations in Region III.

"Joe has done an excellent job leading our activities in Virginia Beach," said Chairman Tony Nicely. "Under Joe's leadership, we expect to rapidly grow both the number of associates and the policies in force."

Thomas joined GEICO in 1972 and held a variety of positions in sales and service, underwriting and human resources in Woodbury and at the Plaza before moving to Macon in 1994. He holds a B.S. degree in business administration from the University of Maryland.

Jan Stewart succeeds Rosalind Phillips, who is retiring, as corporate secretary. Stewart joined GEICO in 2002 as assistant vice president and assistant corporate secretary.

"We are very fortunate to have someone with Jan's extensive employee benefits, tax and legal experience," said Senior Vice President and General Counsel Chuck Davies. "There is nobody better qualified to take on these duties and assist GEICO in its corporate governance efforts."

Stewart holds a bachelor's degree in economics from Illinois State University and a law degree from the University of Illinois.

Rich Guertin's duties include developing strategies to improve GEICO's billing systems and product offerings. Guertin will also evaluate establishing additional capabilities in process reviews.

"Rich brings a wealth of experience in direct response auto insurance operations and process management," said Executive Vice President Bill Roberts.

Guertin joined GEICO earlier this year; he has nearly 30 years experience in the direct response auto insurance industry, including the last 20 at The Hartford. His responsibilities there included managing the three call centers handling the AARP insurance program, CIO of Personal Lines, and head of the Personal Lines Agency force. He has a B.S. in business administration from Drexel University in Philadelphia.

GEICO (Government Employees Insurance Company) is the sixth largest private passenger auto insurer in the United States. It provides auto insurance coverage for more than five million policyholders and insures more than 8.4 million vehicles. GEICO uses television, radio, print media and direct mail to attract customers to call its 1-800-841-3000 number and to its www.geico.com Web site, and keeps its rates low by dealing directly with the customer. GEICO offers sales and claim services 24 hours a day, seven days a week. For more information, go to www.geico.com.