Key elements of the cover include:

? Up to $25,000,000 limit per building on a full value basis.

? No physical damage deductible.

? Only a seven-day business interruption deductible.

? Automatic aggregation, which allows Hiscox to monitor its exposure in any one geographic area.

? Plain English policy wording.

? Physical damage and business interruption insurance offered as standalone coverage or as a combined policy.

The Terrorism Insurance Extranet system provides online policies within 10 minutes and is expected to be adopted by a number of brokers in the U.S., said Hiscox.

"As terrorism has become a fact of life, businesses of all sizes and types are recognizing that they don't have to be the actual target of an attack to suffer damage, loss and interruption to their ongoing business, regardless of their location," the company said.

"As part of its service to brokers and end clients, Hiscox will continue to work alongside the Control Risks Group to provide the latest guidance on terrorism risks and how to minimize the likelihood and impact of an attack," the company said.

Rob Childs, director of underwriting, at Hiscox, commented: "The key thing for brokers is that our new extranet service gives them instant access to capacity for terrorism insurance and then also allows them to offer their clients a very clear and straightforward policy wording.

"That clarity of cover for the client, and ease of use for the broker, offers a simple solution to finding [coverage] that has previously been hard to source."

According to Hiscox, to enable the service to work effectively and to keep the cost of premiums down, the following are excluded from this terrorism coverage:

? Location restrictions in downtown and city center areas of Chicago, Houston, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.

? Chemical and biological terrorism, cyber terrorism, hoax or threat of terrorism and nuclear attacks.

Hiscox's Terrorism Extranet service is now available to pre-selected brokers throughout the U.S. via their London Lloyd ' s brokers. Further information on the extranet service is available by contacting [email protected]