Isn’t it time EVERY business, including Virgin Media, taught their staff about grief?

To have the means to pay off your mortgage in your 30s sounds like a dream scenario. But if you can only do this because a loved one has just been told that they have terminal cancer, it is a bittersweet experience. It’s what happened to me almost six years ago – and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

My husband Greg Gilbert, frontman of indie band Delays at the time, was just 39 when he was told he had incurable colon cancer — and that chemotherapy was the only medical option available.

At the time, we had two young daughters, Dali, three and Bay, a year old, and our house in Southampton was for sale because we had outgrown it.

The only crumb of comfort we could cling to was a critical illness policy that, we were told, would pay off the mortgage in the event that Greg or I had a serious illness, such as a heart attack, stroke, or cancer.

Taking out the policy when we bought the two bedroom property was the only way we could get the loan. I almost canceled the plan just before Greg was diagnosed because I was on maternity leave and money was tight.

I also thought that such a policy was not necessary for young people like Greg and me. How wrong I was – and how glad I was that I hadn’t cancelled.

When the policy was paid off, I took the check for just over £100,000 to the local HSBC branch so I could settle the mortgage – the loan was with the bank.

I was asked for three photo IDs, something I didn’t carry – or even possess. I was told to provide such information – ‘You’ll just have to figure it out.’

I was so upset by the clumsy way I was being treated that I sat on the floor in the middle of the couch and cried in despair. Finally, the branch manager appeared and escorted me to an upstairs suite where I was offered coffee and some tissues.

When I explained my situation, he grabbed his computer and said, “It’s done – the mortgage balance has been settled.”

When I left the bank, the clerk I had originally worked with apologized. He said he didn’t know what to do because it didn’t fit his training.

This was just my first experience with the poor practices some companies have in handling customers looking to resolve sensitive issues.

When Greg died last September, I dreaded managing the family’s financial affairs—cancelling policies, changing account names, and managing loose ends. I was rightly concerned.

I spent hours on the phone with the IRS and Customs explaining why Greg hadn’t completed a tax return – he was in hospice. It had fined him a total of hundreds of pounds for failing to complete the return.

I could hardly believe it when they asked if Greg had been working while he was in the hospice. It wasn’t until after I cried on the phone that they put me through to the grief counseling department, apologized, and declined the fine.

The most difficult experience was canceling our Virgin Media broadband account. As a single parent, I could no longer afford the prices.

Getting through on the phone was hard enough – on three separate occasions I waited up to an hour for someone to answer.

When I finally got through it, I explained my husband’s recent passing and asked to cancel the account. When the line went dead, I assumed everything would be fine.

But I was wrong. I was just cut off. I soon started receiving emails confirming next month’s bill. I called again and was eventually told that everything was settled. But then texts and letters arrived from a debt collection agency.

I was scared. I’ve never had a credit card let alone threatening to contact me to pay off a debt. I paid because I was afraid the agency would come to my house and scare my kids.

In the aftermath of this horrific experience, I read about the difficulties writer George Monbiot had encountered when canceling his mother’s telephone contract with Vodafone after her death.

It was only when he went to social media as a journalist for a national newspaper that the problem was solved. I decided to follow a similar tactic, using my Instagram account.

Virgin Media could not have acted faster. Within hours, it had agreed to cancel my account (something it said it had done four months earlier) and sent a check for the payment I had made to the collection agency.

Unfortunately, such a stressful experience has left me reluctant to proceed with arranging Greg’s paperwork.

Almost a year after his death, I still haven’t canceled his phone contract, his bank account, and his will. It’s so wrong that people like me almost have to beg—or threaten abusive companies with bad publicity—before we get the service we deserve.

It’s time for banks and utilities to act.

Dedicated grief teams should be the norm, not the exception. Contact center and high-street branch staff should be trained to deal with vulnerable customers, and prompt apologies should be made if mistakes are made.