Line slip (delegated underwriting facility)

A marine cargo broker places dozens of near-identical small policies every month. Instead of getting each one signed down the room, it declares them to a line slip, and the slip leader accepts each declaration on behalf of the whole panel, at shares fixed when the slip was set up. A line slip is a framework agreement a broker negotiates with a group of insurers, at Lloyd's or in neighboring markets, that fixes terms, rates and limits in advance for a class of homogeneous risks. As long as a risk falls within the slip's scope, placement takes minutes rather than days, and a stream of small similar risks becomes economic to place. The authority to bind stays with the risk carriers. The leader, sometimes backed by a designated second agreement party, binds the followers, and the broker only presents. That is what separates a line slip from a binding authority, where a coverholder is itself empowered to issue cover. The line blurs when the slip lets declarations below a threshold go through without individual review. Followers signing such a slip then need to know who is actually accepting, and on what basis.