Member Info for Banburyboy

Well done Rox and Idad. Both now top dogs on the Saga Board. Just relieved i did not have to walk the plank on insurance goodwill.

Jo brilliant on the lifeboats very funny

Beach to my horror on my five June / July cruises availability has gone up we previously had 423 empty berths and now have 483 so up by 60. Capacity down from 79% to 76%
All the increase is in the three week cruises and none in the fortnightly.
Any ideas ? Cancelations ? Or have they made more available ? Not sure how hard and fast the 80% rule is

Agree ice cool also small insurance division ! 3 million customers and £134m profit in last year. Doesnt feel small.
Cash at 31st dec was £51m cash now £75m - insurance generated enough cash in final quarter to dwarf travel burn. Leem you are plain wrong and not very well informed.
Ice thanks for furlough / redundancy link need to look at that later.

Leem you have lost me im afraid.
You bemoan the inflated prices of travel companies but agree Saga is 80% insurance.
You worry about government subsidies but agree Saga takes none.
Not getting your train of thought valid comments perhaps for pure travel companies but not Saga

Leem no government cash taken by Saga no furloughs. See earlier posts. No susidisation here.

Leem you popped up a few months ago and said the same thing. The answer is the same now Saga is 80% an insurance company. Market is reacting to solid insurance results which cover travel losses. The like of easy jet tui carnival etc dont have an insrance lifeline they are one trick ponies

Orient - I don't trade and am 98% in Saga so the higher the better.
Its all about balance and I think to regular posters I have displayed that.
They have not Furloughed and either as Beach says they are working (I doubt it) or as Rogue and others said its a conscious decision on doing the right thing.
Even if it the later they are hardly advertising it in there corporate governace statements.
Any way water under the bridge and pleased the market has responded well as i'm all in.

No detail on staff costs or numbers and following on working from home efficiencies.- its an accounting requirement for the finals re staff numbers and costs , these are preliminary's. My guess is withheld by design as very little reduction in staff costs. Jan 20 year we had an average of 5,204 employees and staff costs of £125.6m.

I must confess they could be worse but seriously underwhelmed :
This company messed up on Tour by not ring fencing the clients funds that's why they are in a mess and what is clear from these results is they have not furloughed the tour staff. WHY !!!!
Good news is
- no goodwill write off and no plank and significant headroom so no future prospect
- cautious approach to releasing reserves so more to come this year
Bad news is
- Tour lost a whopping £36.9m nearly as much as cruise. The first half was £18.8m which I wrongly assumed was repatriation costs and would dwindle to a small number in the second half as they furloughed. More fool me
-No windfall from buildings £5m impairment across the entire estate.
Cash position looks great up from £51m at trading update to £75.4m now which I suspect is to do with the timing of the underwriting dividends. Hopefully this and broadly satisfactory insurance results something for the market to take positively.
Disapointed as they clearly have not used the furlough scheme and had they profits would have been materially higher.
Banbury

Sum yes the plank would be embarising.
Agree with my double act Beach sp hard to predict ! Akin to kniting fog or writing on the head of a pin with a mars bar.
Im hoping we still have most of the £51m cash. £50m underlying profit and £15m pre tax loss.
If nothing else these figures should wake the market up to the fact we are mainly insurance.
Tu bigged up some good insurance figures, retention, direct sales, three year fix, higher 2nd half margins, covid claims reductions , lower prior year accidents so lets hope this comes out in numbers.
Good result dont think 25% is impossible. Going to regret this £4.30 !!!!

Thanks Beach
2pm today 5 cruises June / July 79% occupied 423 births available out of 2,000 . 29th March occupancy was 54%
Three of the cruises are weekly and seem to be moving far faster than fornightly ones.
Moving to August and September 5 cruises currenly 426 berths available so also running at 79%. Take out the 24th September 5 day city break which are not going well only 50% occupancy and the other four are at 86%.
Loads of gaps in the schedules so looks like they are waiting to see what sells before marketing.
Longer term October through to Jan 22 (including Adventure to March for the 83 night cruise ) ignoring two city breaks I have 11 cruises 4,400 capacity and 1,844 berths available so 58% occupancy. Not sure if this is good or not views ?
Overall occupancy 21 cruises at 69% - again good or bad views ?
BB

RH and FJ in my opinion you are missing three things :
1 - Results due tomorrow could move this and I cant see it being down.
2 - Its a given that cruise will do well its just a matter of timing and the market knows that
3 - Most importantly Saga is 80% an insurance company and this area has struggled in the last few years and sign of a turnaround will push the price on.

What did the TU in January say :
1 Full years would have a profit before tax . Half year was £15.9m. Comprising retail £42m underwriting £28m, travel -£34.2m , other -£11.3m and Finance £8.6m. So a safe bet there
2 - Available cash £51m excluding one off's burn was £9m in 5 months to Jan 21 . I don't think Bennets was in there so hoping we still have circa £51m
3 - Premium of 5ppts on lower covid claims and favourable claims experience on prior year claims. No one has been able to quantify 5ppts.
4 . The update said margins higher in second half than first as more renewels rather than new claims
5 Linking to the above TU said 596k of fixed deals and here's the important thing 60% of all new direct business sales and direct business is fixed sales, and direct business is 59% of total business. So 36% of all business is high margin direct and locked in for three years. 18 months ago that was nil. I cannot stress how key I feel this is
6 Should get sale proceeds of building in Folkstone.

Things that worry me / I want to see :
1. mixed currencies on forward cruise booking the 100% 80% thing because of covid restrictions makes comparisons difficult and misleading . So one to watch out for
2. I have still not seen in writing that the company has taken any furlough money - they should have done and I suspect they have not. My AGM question :)
3. The travel loss in the first half were cruise £15.4m and Tour £18.8m. Travel was insulated by £16.3m revenue. I am not expecting the half year £34.2m to change for the second half but would expect Tour loss to go down and cruise up. I cant see in the second half how tour costs would not fall unless they have NOT furloughed staff. The first half will be repatriations.
4. Some sort of payback for the £28.2m restructuring charge in the first half - lower overhead/ working from home dividend / lower rate and rents.

I am going to be brave and say £50m underlying profit and £15m loss before tax comprising £60m travel goodwill write off and the rest restructuring offset by sales of non core business.
IMO clear sign of insurance turnaround and this will fly
Happy Easter all BB

All a bit slower over Easter. One cruise June and four July total capacity 2,000 cabins. At 4 pm today 1,541 booked and 77% capacity. Interested to see if stay cation announcement later will push this on .
Did some research up until March 22 and not quite as good as i hoped. Need to sumerise but two observations
1. They do a five day continental tour Amsterdam etc by far the poorest take up 5th Oct 35% booked 15th November 26%
2. Adventure has a 83 night tour of South America starting 5th Jam 22. This is huge and an a quarter of that ships year. 48% booked eight months in advance feels good.
Banbury

Not quite sold out like Viking. But 506 cabins left at time of writing. 75% of capacity.
At 4pm on 29th March we had 920 left and booking were 54%. So bodes well

Horse welcome back i know you were really poorly with Covid. Really hope you are on the mend. Super prices target was £234 per person but probably need to add 10% for covid and inflation. So every £1 above £260 will be 300k to the bottom line.
My analysis is on the June and July cruises. I dont have a feel for longer term. Ive a feeling they could run staycation at full pelt until the end of October and sell out.

Only two in the sweepstakes which ended 4.30.
To recap 2,000 births available in 5 sailings within UK and Norway Fjords 920 were available at 4pm on 29th March Occupancy 54%
73 hours later at 5.30 on 1st April 596 berths are available. 70% occupancy
They have sold 324 berths or 108 a day on five cruises . If that is replicated across the entire range that's 16% of available capacity sold in three days.
I know I am a Saga fan but these figures are spectacular and my advice to people thinking of getting in is buy before Wednesday when these figures will be highlighted.
As for the sweep Beachburn went for 71% and Banbury 67%. Close race but the prize goes to Beach.
Made up with these figures - enjoy Easter all. Hope for our Easter gift on the 7th :)

68 hours in to sample (12 noon today) availibilty down from 920 cabins to 638 (47 gone since six yesterday evening)
Capacity over same period up from 54% to 68%.
Interesting a rush on booking for Adventure 17 of the 47 that was previously moving slowely.
Take Beach's word this is the equivalent of flying off the shelves

The Daily Telegraph reports that Sagas accounts due on 7th April will include the entire write down of its insurance business that now has an intrisic value of Nil.
April Fool :)

Sum inaugural cruise in 26 July and uk based. 141 cabins left from 400. As mentioned earlier the one week cruises selling at least twice as fast as the two week one which the inaugural cruise is.