It used to be that everyone had a landline phone in their home and locating a number or address simply required opening the white pages and searching for the name. It is often more complicated now that cell phones are in common use and many people do not even have landlines, and if they do their number may be unpublished.

Even with the invention of caller ID on most landlines, some numbers may come up without an identifying name and there are ways for callers to stop their name from showing up. Reverse phone lookup providers have stepped up to these changing demands to provide a very valuable service to resourceful phone users.

There are two common functions for these services.

Locating Names

If you are receiving calls from someone and only a number shows on your ID, or you need to figure out cell phone callers, reverse phone lookup services can assist in finding the name listed to the phone number of concern. Just by entering the phone number you will have access to the person who is behind those bothersome phone calls.

People in search of such services include those who need to identify a number frequently calling 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 Other people may use lookup directories when they want to find a name connected to a home phone that is unpublished. If you have a number but are uncertain who it belongs to, a reverse phone lookup service can assist you.

Locating Addresses

another common use is to find an address for someone, whether you know the name of the person or not. Once you gain access to the contact information connected with a particular number most directories will deliver other sorts of information as well, which includes the address of the home phone or an address listed to a cell phone number.

This may not be an everyday need for most people, but it does have its benefits in quite a few situations. Such as a parent desperate to locate a teenager who has run off or is still out well past curfew. If they can get access to numbers from the teenager's belongings or cell phone a lookup directory could quickly reveal addresses as well as names of places the teenager may be at that time.

More common circumstances may be searching for addresses to mail out party invitations to your child's peers. If you have their phone number you can find their address and easily deliver the invite without calling and tracking down other busy family.

These services can also give you access to other sorts of data, such as income brackets or previous addresses, and one site even gives a map with an rough pinpoint of the most current location.

There will be a small charge for any up to date reverse phone lookup service, but if your business or personal life demands accurate data it is more than worth the payoff in the long run. The fee is required because this kind of information is not easy or completely free to research, pull together, and store, so issuing it immediately to consumers like you must also include a charge to cover such serviceable costs.

There more than likely will never be a phone book for cell phone numbers, and even if there were it is probable the majority of the numbers would be unpublished just like many landline numbers today. The best way to obtain access to these numbers is to give a minor fee either to complete a one time phone number search or to join a lookup directory if you will be using the service on a regular basis.