My wife loves Christmas.

Favorite time of year, hands down, might even be the favorite thing period after our daughter.

And I'm okay being second to a holiday, knowing exactly how much she loves Christmas.

The lights, the tree, the garland,

the presents each wrapped in a bow, the whole mid-century nostalgic Christmas song day.

And while this love of hers also means that I'm out buying a tree and hanging lights from

our eaves, however few hours after Thanksgiving is sensitive and sensible, I love her love for

it. The whole house and everyone in it is transformed.

So imagine what sort of snarling monster my wife might become if someone ever tried to tell her

Christmas was canceled. She would turn that grinch inside out. But for thousands of families in the

UK, no one was there to stop the company Fair Pack from

robbing them of Christmas in 2006. In today's Saturday matinee, we're bringing you an episode

from the podcast Cautionary Tales, one that tells the story of the thousands of families who

saved for Christmas through a savings club that wasn't a bank, wasn't great value for money,

and eventually went bust.

I hope you enjoy. And while you're listening, be sure to search for and follow Cautionary Tales.

We put a link in the show notes to make it easy for you.

It was Friday the 13th, and some people would have expected bad luck.

Susie Hall didn't.

She knew, of course, that life could deal out some hard knocks.

A decade before, when she was 28, she was attacked in the street in her home city of

Edinburgh by three men who took her purse, her car, and her peace of mind. Now in her late 30s,

...