I had to use Garden Island Mortuary for a someone who passed away in my family. Contacted them and explained what was going on, body at the morgue and autopsy to be performed and asked if they could pick up the deceased to deliver to their Mortuary for cremation. Communication and process went well. Bruce even traveled afar to deliver forms for me to sign. Another service was they delivered the ashes to my home. Thank you Janice for the delivery. Used their chapel and lanai area for the funeral. Everything went well. Im so relieved. Glad that's all behind me now. Thank you Garden Island Mortuary. read more

Garden Island Mortuary would receive zero stars if that were a possible rating. They conducted a viewing with the wrong body and Bruce was too busy to even talk to us before, during, or after to correct the matter. What was supposed to be a final goodbye was robbed from a grandfathers only grandson. Additionally, there is the concern of the other family that was involved in this matter. Our family member was to be cremated, while the other body was to be buried. Future customers BEWARE they do no handle your loved ones with respect. The most disrespectful, unprofessional, and inappropriate experience for us in our time of grief. We are extremely upset and will never be conducting business here. read more

This mortuary is truly the worst of the worst. Father committed suicide and was considered unclaimed because the authorities did not attempt to locate me. 3 months passed before I learned of his death. The Kauai Police Department informed me , because he was unclaimed the State covered the cremation expenses. We spoke to Bruce twice and he confirmed state paid and we can pick up remains and we scheduled a time. When I arrived the clerk demanded $1600 to release remains which I did not have and had to make the devastating decision to leave his remains. read more

These people are the most dishonest people. Do not use them because they will slam you with extra charges. My father's wishes were to be interred in a VA cemetery on the mainland so all I needed was cremation services, death certificates, and mailing. My Dad died on Saturday and Kauai Island Mortuary picked him up that morning. No one had called me by Monday morning so I called them and the young woman said she would make an appointment for me. I told her I did't need an appointment since the plans were already determined and I didn't need to sit for a sales job. On Tuesday, a funeral director called me, noted what I needed, and quoted me prices. He did NOT send me an invoice, he did NOT request payment, and he did NOT tell me there would be a $50 per day storage charge after 5 days from pick up. On Friday, they called me demanding payment and telling me about the storage charge which was already in effect. In addition, if I paid with a check, the storage charge would apply until the check clears. This is all a scam for them to get more money since I did't pay for their complete services. I am so sorry hospice referred them to me. It is just amazing how unethical these people are. Luckily, the mortuary I am dealing with on the mainland is on the up and up. read more

All of our dealings with Garden Island Mortuary were through Bruce Hiraoka, who uses his cell phone as the company's business phone. We found Bruce to be disorganized and unreliable. After some discussion we opted for a direct cremation of our daughter, without viewing, and Bruce promised to do this by the following Sunday. We called him two days after that to confirm that the cremation had taken place. He said he still hadn't done it and asked us if we wanted a viewing (!). Bruce had promised to store the ashes for some time before scattering, but after this miscommunication and after reading other Yelp reviews we felt that we could not rely on Bruce to store the ashes securely. Our only option was to change mortuaries. We called Bruce to tell him this. His mailbox was full. When we finally reached him he told us that it would cost us $3763 to release our daughter's body to the other mortuary even though Bruce had done nothing but pick up the body and store it for a week. Among other things he wanted to charge us for an embalming that we hadn't authorized. We bargained it down to $2511, which was still nearly as much as the second mortuary charged for actually performing the services that Bruce promised and failed to do. read more

It's never a good thing to have to meet someone at a mortuary, but Bruce made everything so easy, comforting and understandable. He catered to all of our requests- including a super last minute viewing (like same hour request). I always tell everyone to go see him because he had extended the same comfort to my aunty when my uncle passed away. read more

My review is a little late but every year on the anniversary of my dad's death (it's been 14 years today) and any time I have to pass it, I unfortunately remember this place. So I'm finally writing the review I meant to back then. (So if it's under new management since then, this review may be void.) We were already reeling from a death we weren't totally expecting; having to deal with GI Mortuary and their unsympathetic sales tactics really drove it home. Their business is death, and they make sure you know that it is a business. No sympathy, no kind hearts, get in and get out.( Look, I get it, it's tough being sadly sympathetic alll the time - but you have to realize that job hazard when you decide to take on that business.) My father was buried with full military honors & benefit (active duty), in fact, so maybe they were trying to get more $ out of it, I don't know. They just made an already sad event worse. We did move him to Borthwick and had a much better experience dealing with them. Much more sympathy, even much more light in the place. I wonder how much business they actually get from families like us who just don't want to deal with even more stress at an already stressful time. read more

I am stunned that it would cost this much to donate a body to science. Hi Robert, Please see below the cost of forwarding remains to Honolulu: * Forwarding remains to another mortuary - $ 2,700 Our charge includes: Basic service of Funeral Director and Staff; a proportionate share of overhead costs, embalming, processing of remains for shipment, transportation to airport, transfer of remains from Hospital to funeral home. (This charge does not include use of facilities and staff or ceremonies casket, shipping container or shipping charges.) * Shipping - $350 * Air Tray Combo - $600 Total : $ 3,650 plus tax Hope this helps! Jocelyn Contrades Garden Island Mortuary Here's their defense of the quote after I said it was for services not needed and that it disregarded the social benefit of donating bodies to science. [Their response] The quote I provided is accurate based on the General Price List of the company, which was last updated on August 29, 2012. The only thing that may differ is the shipping, it is only an estimated cost. The actual cost will come from the Airlines that will be used. Jocelyn Contrades Garden Island Mortuary 332-7321 read more

My father and my mother in law passed away within the same month. Bruce made this process as easy as it could be for such a difficult time for our family. On both occasions, he picked up our loved ones as soon as we called. He is very organized and informative, and he genuinely seems to care about the families he helps. My husband's family originally was going to use Kaua'i Memorial Gardens, but the person they spoke to when they called after the hospital was not very helpful or sympathetic. It was a Saturday evening, so they said that it was "after hours" and they would not pick up my mother in law until Monday. When we tried to schedule an appointment to discuss arrangements, we were told that we needed to wait for them to call us. It didn't feel right, so our family asked me to reach out to Bruce from Garden Island Mortuary. At 9pm that evening, he immediately replied and said he would go to the hospital that evening. He took care of my mother in law that very evening, and fit our family in for an appointment the very next Sunday afternoon. Being able to take care of the arrangements so quickly rather than waiting through the weekend really helped to put our minds and hearts at ease. Bruce was also very open to our special requests to incorporate some cultural protocol into the process. Losing a loved one, in our case two loved ones, is so very difficult, but we really appreciate our experiences with Garden Island Mortuary. read more