I was wondering if the SDopers have any experience with paying these on-line “people find” websites to locate an old friend. Are any worthwhile? Any recommendations for a good site to try? (Any free sites out there?) Any tips on what to avoid? Etc…Please share your experiences.
Thanks,
I used one to find my brother. He’s been incommunicado for a couple years and I had no idea if he was OK. I paid $40 and they told me where he lives (same place he’s lived for many years). I’m not even sure which service I used…probably U-Search. I’m glad I did it…at least I know he’s alive.
I paid to join up with FriendsReunited (which I think is similar to classmates.com in the USA), specifically to try to trace my childhood best buddy; I found him (he joined up after me), but he didn’t respond to emails, then he went missing off the list of registered names; I contacted his sister, who told me that he had decided quite a while ago to cut himself off from his past and didn’t want contact with anybody from that era.
I think she was probably telling a lie to spare my feelings (after all, why would he have joined up with FriendsReunited if he wanted to cut himself off?).
It was a shame, but then again, we’re different people now with different lives and have little more in common than any two random strangers; the past was fun, but the present is where I live now.
I paid for classmates.com gold for a while, found an old love (incidentally the one who introduced me to the straight dope when we were children) and realised some people are best left unfound (though it was good to know they’d found happiness).
I found a bunch of people on Classmates. Most of it has been good. I have my highschool reunion this summer, and not many are going to show up, which is a drag. But I hope to have enough people there to make it worthwhile.
I’m a bit wary of such people-finder services.
I’ve not used them to research other people, but on occasion I like to research my own name as a way to make sure that nothing funny is going on (identity theft and the like). Nothing I tried could place me at the the address or phone number I lived at for just over 6 years (I moved a little over a month ago). And it’s not like I was hiding. During that time I was signed up for the full compliment of utilities, taken out loans, held a job, registered a car, signed up for credit cards, etc. I made no real effort to hide myself or anything.
However, I suppose it’s possible that they might find the impetus to update their info if you paid them. You may want to ask them about that. Thinking about it now, I might ask a trusted friend to do a paid lookup on me to see what is found.
It sounds like people are having better luck on the opt-in sites, like classmates.com. makes sense, given that those on such sites generally want to be found. I haven’t tried that myself.