Locating Telephone Records

The phone number is one important component of an entity's information. Find Phone allows you to use name and address to locate a person or a company's phone number. The data is from the Electronic Directory Assistance.

Returned elements may include some or all of the following: name (person or company), phone type (residential or business), owner’s address, and phone number.

Topics in this help are listed below:

• Quick Start



• Search Tips



• Results Display



• Next Steps

You can search for phone numbers using one or both of the following search techniques:

• Search by Last Name (or Company Name), and State.



• Search by Street Address, City, and State.

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Search Tips

Search Options

• You can limit searches to include only Residences or only Business records. The default is All (both Residence and Business).
  Note: If you use the default setting, you may get a large results set. It is recommended that you select either Residence or Business in your initial search.



• Find Similar Sounding Names option may be used when your search with the exact name does not yield any result.

Reference Code

This is an optional field. It can be your case name or number. You can enter an alpha-numeric string. This information may be used to track all the searches for a case or for billing. For a normal user you will find Reference Code in the Comprehensive Report for person; for an administrator, you will find the Reference Code in the Activity and Billing Info.

Search by Last Name/Company Name

Even though search by the exact names is highly recommended, there are times you may search with partial names. For example, when you are unsure of a name's spelling, enter only the beginning letters which you are sure of. All the records that contain the same initial characters will be returned.

First names are automatically matched to common nicknames, as well as entries which contain only initials. For example, a search for "Joseph Smith" will return records that contain "Joe Smith" and "Smith, J."

For businesses, the system automatically treats the input as partial names. For example, a search for "ABC Learning" will return all records containing the key words, such as “ABC Learning Center”.

Search by Address

Search by address will return the phone numbers for all the individuals/businesses that are currently and historically located at the same address.

Name fields are not mandatory when you search with Street Address, City, and State.

To limit your search to a certain block on a street, enter the block number followed by an asterisk (*). For example, to search the 100 block of Main Street, enter “1* Main Street”; to search the 1200 block, type "12* Main Street".

Notes:

• A search of the 100 block (1*) will match addresses in the 100 and 10000 range. A search of the 1200 block will match addresses in the 1200 to 12000 range.



• To search a specific range of house numbers, enter the range separated by a colon (:). For example, to search for everyone between 120 Main Street and 220 Main Street, enter "120:220 Main St."

Search with Radius

Radius is used in combination with name or address search.

If you are unsure of the exact city, supply the closest city and specify a radius (no more than 100 miles). This expands the area considered to a circle extending the specified number of miles from the center of that city.

Notes:

• If you do not include a city and state, the radius option is not allowed.



• When conducting a radius search, you can exclude the specified city by checking the Exclude City checkbox. This is useful when searching for a subject who lives near a major city but not actually in that city.

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Results Display

The results list is organized in the ascending alphabetic order of the displayed last name or company name.

Returned elements, from left to right, include some or all of the following:

• Type – Phone type which can be B (business), R (residential), and RB (both residential and business)
  Note: Since the Last Name field also allows Company Name, when your search option is set to All, even if you enter a person’s name with state, the results list may include both individual as well as business records.



• Name – Owner’s full name



• Phone – 10-digit phone number plus its local time zone indicator



• Caption – Brief description of the phone number such as “Store Main Number”

Too Many Records Found

If the number of records found that match your search criteria exceeds the maximum record limit, the system returns “Too many records found”. There is no charge for this search.

For full name search, the maximum number of records allowed is 2000; for partial name search, the maximum number allowed is 3000.

Find a Record in the Results List

Try to identify the unique listings by examining the information displayed. Make sure the records you pick fit into what is already known about the subject.

Narrow Results List

If your search returns a long list of results, adding criteria, such as middle initial, may limit the number of records displayed. The more criteria you provide, the more precise (narrow) the results will be.

If your search input is Last Name alone, add the following criteria, if known, in this order:

1. First Name or first initial - If you are not sure of the entire first name, type an initial or the first few letters in the First Name field.



2. State - Enter a state to narrow the results to subjects living in that state.



3. City - Enter a city, in addition to the state, to further narrow the results to subjects living in the specified city and state.



4. Middle Initial - If your results return multiple listings with the same first and last name, add the Subject's middle initial to exclude records without middle initials.

Expand Results List

If too few or no results are returned,

• Loosen the search by removing the most precise or uncertain criteria such as middle initial or the street address.



• Use search option Find Similar Sounding Names if you are conducting a name search. This will add to the number of records returned.



• Use search option All instead of limiting the search to either residential or business.

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Next Steps

After the initial search, there are several things you can do:

• Search deeper on a specific returned element by clicking its hyper-link. For more details please reference the Next Steps section of Person Search help page.



• Copy/Print/Email one or all of the records on the results list by clicking . For more details please reference the Next Steps section of Person Search help page.



• Export the results list to Excel. For more details please reference the Next Steps section of Person Search help page.

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