Not long ago, everyone had a standard phone in their home and searching for a phone number or address was a matter of opening the yellow pages and searching for their name. It is often more difficult now that cell phones are widely used and many people do not even have landlines, and if they do their number may be unpublished.
Even with the development of caller ID on most landlines, many numbers may show up without an identifying name and there are ways for callers to block their details from showing up. Reverse phone lookup providers have responded to these changing times to offer a very timely service to modern phone users.
There are two common uses for lookup directories.
Finding Names
If you are receiving calls from someone and only a number is revealed on your ID, or you want to identify cellular phone callers, reverse phone lookup services can help you find out the name registered to the number in question. Just by typing in the number you will be able to identify the person who is behind the bothersome phone calls.
People looking for this service include those who need to check up on a number constantly phoning their spouse or children's cell phone, since there is no public directory for cell phone numbers. Other people may use lookup directories when they need to identify a name connected to a home phone that may be unlisted. Anytime you have a number but aren't sure who it belongs to, a reverse phone lookup service can help.
Finding Addresses
The other typical purpose is to find an address for someone, whether you know the name of the person or not. Once you plug into the contact information associated with a specific phone number most directories will deliver other sorts of information as well, which includes the address of the home phone or the address associated with a cell phone number.
This may not be a common need for some people, but it does have its benefits in quite a few situations. Such as a parent needing to find a teenager who has run away or has not returned home long after curfew. If they can get access to numbers from the teenager's belongings or cell phone a reverse phone lookup could quickly reveal addresses as well as names of places the child may be located.
Other circumstances may be searching for addresses to send out party invitations to your child's classmates. If you have their phone number you can get their address and easily deliver the invite without calling and tracking down other busy people.
These services can also give you access to other kinds of data, such as income brackets and previous addresses, and one site even gives a map with an general pinpoint of where the home or business is located.
There is a nominal price for any legitimate reverse phone lookup website, but if your business or personal life requires accurate information it is money well spent in the long run. The fee is required because this sort of information is not easy or free to research, collect, and store, so distributing it on demand to consumers such as you must also come with a fee to account for such serviceable costs.
There probably will never be a public directory for cell phone numbers, and even if there were most likely many of the numbers would be unpublished just like many home phone numbers right now. The best way to get access to these phone numbers is to give a small charge either to complete a single phone number search or to join a lookup service if you will be using the directory on a regular basis.