Even the fact that we'd publish articles about standard markets insurers writing specialty coverages is unsurprising, although the identities of the two highlighted in this month's lead article did give our editors a moment's pause.

Beyond that, it was actually easier to predict our recurring topics than it was to choose the name of the first of what we hope will be a growing collection of e-newsletters produced by the editors of National Underwriter's property-casualty magazine in years to come.

Credit for the title goes to NU's marketing department, and while E-and-S-slash-Specialty Lines Extra isn't especially memorable or mellifluous as titles go, we would be hard pressed to come up with something better.

The insurance we write about here is sometimes placed in the excess and surplus lines insurance marketplace--hence the "E&S" at the front of the title. At other times, the coverage is written on admitted paper, explaining the need for the "slash-Specialty" in our name.

"Extra?"

Our e-newsletter is an "extra"--an added bonus--to NU magazine, focusing on one specific slice of the p-c insurance market. In addition, the idea our marketing gurus probably had in mind was to conjure up an image of a newsboy peddling papers, offering the latest headlines in the days before we could deliver news of breaking developments via wire services and e-mails.

As the months passed, the creators of NU's E&S/Specialty Lines Extra e-newsletter would discover they were not alone in their quest to find a fitting title or to build a brand in the E&S/Specialty market.

In case you missed it, the article in our June edition, titled "Business Strategies Vary Widely Among Specialty Carriers In Softening Market," was just one indication that the search for a name has been an unexpected topic of discussion among leaders in this market segment.

"I fine people in our company when they use that term," said Tom Nerney, president and chief executive officer of United States Liability Group, referring to the term "E&S"--a term he reserves for an "emotional" individual-risk underwriting process that underwriters at his company don't practice.

However, Paul Springman, president and chief operating officer for Markel Corp., said that "we love the term E&S. We love the fact that we are individual-account underwriters. That's our history and our passion."

Among other things, Mr. Nerney believes the use of the term "E&S" encourages a narrow, market-of-last-resort mindset that prompts MGAs and other specialty insurers to adopt reactive strategies in soft markets.

Seeking to shake their "market-of-last-resort" brand, executives of the American Association of Managing General Agents are redefining the value of MGAs for their retail agent customers and inviting retailers to look to MGAs as their first stop for standard coverage, we reported in another article in last month's edition.

Back in March, one of our early e-newsletter articles also reported a similar initiative taking shape at the National Association of Professional Surplus Lines Offices, with the group putting nearly half-a-million dollars behind a campaign to market the value of wholesale brokers--their access to insurance companies and their expertise--to retail agent customers.

With AAMGA and NAPSLO busy working on the big task of branding, we're inviting our readers to tackle the smaller one--the issue of an appropriate title.

What should participants in the E&S and specialty lines marketplace call themselves? Should different names be used to distinguish those operating on a nonadmitted basis from those that offer coverage on admitted paper?

If you're like me, you may not know exactly where or when the term "excess and surplus" originated in the first place. Bernie Heinze, executive director of the AAMGA, provided an answer to that question, along with a little bit of history, in a recent e-mail.

"Admitted insurers have never been able to address all of the insurance needs of industry. In many cases, the unusual exposure presented is beyond the scope of the admitted market underwriters' experience; in others the magnitude of the potential loss exceeds the capacity of all of the admitted insurers combined," he wrote.

"As industry has grown, so has the need for greater capacity and the ability of insurers to cover the new risks which are evolving," he continued.

"Early on, Lloyd's of London stepped forward to fill the gap...The entrepreneurial Lloyd's underwriters were alert to the great potential of this country, and in 1890 Cuthbert Heath wrote the first American risk ever in Lloyd's 'non-marine' market," he noted.

"Recognizing that nonadmitted insurers such as Lloyd's were necessary when admitted insurers were unable to fill industry's insurance needs, the regulators established special rules to permit the writing of insurance with nonadmitted carriers under certain circumstances," he said.

"As the coverage to be written was excess or 'surplus' of the amount or type that could be written in the admitted market, the nonadmitted market came to be known as the 'Excess & Surplus Lines' market," he explained.

By the way, for those of you who don't know already, Mr. Heinze has launched his own mini-crusade over terminology. Despite his use of the term "nonadmitted" in the discussion above, he wants to eliminate that particular word from insurance dictionaries.

"Let's call it what it is [and] eliminate the confusion for consumers who want to buy good, quality insurance," he said, noting that businessowners are likely to feel uncomfortable when they see the word nonadmitted on their policies.

"How would you feel if you heard, 'Congratulations, your son has just been nonadmitted to college?'" he asked. "Is that good news or bad?'" you'd want to know, Mr. Heinze suggested.

Waging his battle "state by state [and] insurance department by insurance department," Mr. Heinze insists, "It is not nonadmitted. It is excess and surplus lines."

Do you agree? What's the right name? E&S lines? Specialty lines? Nonadmitted coverage? Nonstandard market? The something-extra marketplace?

Feel free to e-mail me at [email protected] with your suggestions.

Also feel free to e-mail me with comments related to any of our article content. We appreciate the attention of readers who point out errors or items requiring clarification, as they did with two recent items--a D&O chart correction for the first article of our last e-newsletter, and a clarification of United States Liability Insurance Group's figures on the Top 20 Group ranking presented in NU magazine. See related article for details.