Charlotte, NC (November 28, 2005) - Continental Tire North America, Inc. (CTNA) announced today that it has launched the first online financial claims management system in the North American tire industry.  This online initiative was designed to streamline the processing of financial claims for CTNA's business partners and to eliminate a majority of the documentation which was previously submitted in hard copy format.

"The new system allows our business partners to quickly and easily submit and track their financial claims through this interactive online tool," said Ken Dumitru, Director of Business Systems/e-Commerce.  "It also gives CTNA the ability to address potential bottlenecks in our financial claim processing, identify and target areas to best improve customer service, and we expect it to assist us to address the source of claims through improvement in business processes."

The new financial claims management system offers the ability to not just enter and track claims, but also to search for claims they have made in the past, print credits and submit back-up documentation, creating a more seamless process that allows CTNA customer service representatives to better respond and facilitate requests. 

The system will eliminate the need to complete paper claim forms and cut down on the time for processing since there will be no mail time involved.  Customer service representatives will also be able to provide almost instantaneous responses and requests for further information, eliminating duplication that could occur in paper processing.

Additionally, ContiLink, CTNA's secure Internet web portal created to allow business partners access to various business processes such as ordering product and tracking shipments, has added more sophisticated order upload functionality, access to CTNA's Co-Op and Gold Programs, OE fitment guides in PDF and Excel formats, and multiple invoice printing.  Dumitru added: "These initiatives reflect Continental's commitment to continuously improve customer service to meet the changing demands of our dealers' business needs."

Continental Tire North America, Inc. (www.continentaltire.com), based in Charlotte, North Carolina, is a group company of Germany-based Continental Corporation, a leading supplier of brake systems, chassis components, vehicle electronics, tires and technical elastomers. In 2004 the corporation realized sales of EUR 12.6 billion (USD 16 billion). At present it has a worldwide workforce of more than 81,000.