Send All Grannies Away. (Saga)

Member Name: robinlawrie

Product:	Saga
Date:	06/09/01 (388 review reads)
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One of these days, if you are very lucky, you will wake up and discover that you have reached the heady height of 50 years of age. What is special about this particular birthday, apart from more candles than you can manage? About the only thing that really affects you, is that you now can join the hallowed ranks of SAGA.

Contrary to popular belief, SAGA does not stand for “send all grannies away” nor does it stand for either “Sex at Grannies age” or any of the other suggestions that I am sure will be in my comments box very shortly. It stands for “Social Activities in the Golden Age.”

The web site for SAGA is at www.saga.co.uk and has only recently been upgraded. The upgrade has in my opinion is more user friendly and colourful but has slowed the website down. The home page has on it the three main headings that SAGA specialises in. These being:


•Health
•Travel
•Insurance


There is also a button that enables you to listen to SAGA Radio. Clicking on this takes you to “Prime Time Radio” and fires up your media player. You will then be able to listen to “ Hits from the last 60 years”…. Not impressed? No nor was I so let’s move on to their three main buttons:


•HEALTH
Health is split into 5 sub-headings.
“A/Z Supplements” are a detailed list in alphabetical order giving a comprehensive description of supplements from Aloe Vera to Zinc.

“Aromatherapy” gives expert guidance on the uses and applications of essential oils.

“ Health issues” consist of a comprehensive library of problems facing the elderly. The subject matter varies from blood sugar levels and cholesterol to dietary needs and exercising.

“Lifestyle” has advice on living a fuller life no matter what age. It advises among other things on alcoholic drinks (spoilsport
s) and convenience foods. So watch out for the queues of pensioners at your local McDonalds.

“Monitoring health” is an extremely important subject and covers methods of monitoring: body fat, blood pressure, and pulse rate. It also gives advice on various forms of pain relief.

•TRAVEL
Travel is probably what most people associate with SAGA. This part of the site breaks the holiday down into the various types of holidays, such as cruises, resorts, and flights. Each of these is covered by an excellent and competent search engine, which has easy to understand instructions. There is also a button on the page, which says, “Ask an Expert”. Clicking on this simply takes you to a FAQ part of the site and the opportunity to email a pleasant looking Richard Pickering.
It is made very simple to book online using an excellent secure server, or if you wish to request a brochure be posted to your home.

Looking at the prices of some of the holidays, I was disappointed to see that they all looked expensive to me. I am quite sure that if I shopped around online or indeed walked into a travel agent, I would have saved money. The advantage? of SAGA is that selecting a holiday with them makes it more likely that your vacation will be spent with other SAGA users.

•INSURANCE
This part of the site has every possible type of insurance that can be imagined from motoring and home to travel and health. By simply selecting the particular item that you require insurance on, you bring up the easily filled in boxes and within a minute or two have a quote on the screen in front of you. The proof of the pudding is however in the eating and the only reason that you would use SAGA for insurance is if they were the cheapest. In the interest of fairness I put my car and my house to the test. SAGA I am afraid did rather badly. The house insurance was £35 cheaper and car insurance a staggering £180 cheaper elsewhere.
The cheaper quotes were by the same company “Admiral Insurance”.

To sum up, this is an excellent site for the elderly or even those not so old as it offers excellent advice on health and living, which is directed at this part of the community. As far as their holidays and insurance go however, I can only advise that you shop around before you buy.

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