How many phone numbers does skip tracing return?
Skip tracing returns anywhere from zero to a service's cap of phone numbers per owner. Skipmatch's cap is 10 phone numbers, each labeled mobile, landline or VoIP, plus up to 3 emails. How many a given owner gets depends on what the records hold: one number, several, or none.
Key facts
- Price
- a flat $0.03 a record at any list size from 50 to 100,000 records.
- Unit
- Priced per matched record.
- Minimum order
- 50 records
- Minimum charge
- Minimum charge $0.50 when any record matches.
- Single search
- Single search: $0.10, charged only on a match, paid from prepaid credit ($10 minimum top-up).
- Prepaid credit
- Prepaid credit expires 12 months after your last credit purchase, single search or credit-paid list, and unused credit is refundable on request within 90 days of purchase.
- Free tool
- Check your list free at /tools/skip-trace-csv-checker. Check columns, split addresses and download a fixed CSV in your browser before tracing at $0.03 a record. No account needed.
- Subscription
- None. A list order is paid for on its own by card or prepaid credit.
- Max per order
- 100,000 rows or 50 MB per file
- Output
- Up to 10 phones per owner, each with its line type (mobile, landline or VoIP), plus emails where found
- Sources
- 3 core providers: idiCORE, Enformion and Delvepoint
- Not for
- FCRA uses: credit, insurance, employment or tenant screening
- Prices last changed
- Last updated
Short answer
Services cap how many numbers they return per record, and an owner can come back with anything from none up to that cap. A Skipmatch result has room for 10 phone numbers and 3 emails per owner. Some rows fill several phone columns, some fill one, and some come back empty. The published maximums of other services are in the table below, in their own words.
A higher cap is room, not a result: no service in this guide, Skipmatch included, publishes how many numbers a typical record gets, and none is implied here. Nor is every returned number current. Numbers linger in the records after people drop them, so work through an owner's numbers in order rather than stopping at the first.
What Skipmatch returns
A result file keeps your own columns first (12 in the sample file), in their original order, with one row back for every unique row you sent (exact duplicate rows are removed first). After them come these columns.
| Columns | What they hold | Per owner |
|---|---|---|
Phone1 to Phone10 | Phone numbers for the owner, in the order they are listed. Blank cells mean no further number was found. | Up to 10 |
Phone1Type to Phone10Type | The line type of the number beside it: Mobile, Landline or VOIP. | One per phone |
Email1 to Email3 | Email addresses where the record has them. None are guessed. | Up to 3 |
HitFlag | HIT when the row came back with at least one phone or email, MISS when it did not. | One per row |
Record status | New, Updated or Previously purchased: whether you have run this record with Skipmatch before. | One per row |
Here is how the ten owners in the sample file came back. The names and counts are invented to show the layout; they are not typical results and not a benchmark.
| Owner (invented) | Phones | Emails | HitFlag |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marisol Vandergraaf | 3 | 1 | HIT |
| Desmond Okonkwo-Bly | 2 | 0 | HIT |
| Ilonka Pfeffernuss | 4 | 1 | HIT |
| Thaddeus Ravensbourne | 0 | 0 | MISS |
| Junipero Castellanos-Wick | 5 | 2 | HIT |
| Anouk Vlietstra | 1 | 0 | HIT |
| Cormac Threlkeld | 3 | 1 | HIT |
| Seraphine Odhiambo | 0 | 0 | MISS |
| Bartholomew Quintanilla-Oye | 6 | 2 | HIT |
| Xiomara Brennecke | 2 | 0 | HIT |
The numbers come as contact data for lawful business outreach. They are not scrubbed against do-not-call or litigator lists, so if you call or text, following the TCPA, the do-not-call registries and state law is yours. Every account accepts the permissible-use terms before its first order. This is general information, not legal advice.
Published maximums by service
What each service says a skip trace can return, quoted from its own page and dated. Skipmatch is one of the services compared. Every figure is an "up to" cap, exactly as published.
| Service | Phones | Emails | As published | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Skipmatch | Up to 10 | Up to 3 | 10 phone columns, each with its line type, and 3 email columns in every result file. | Sample result file |
| REsimpli | Up to 10 | Up to 3 | “up to 10 phone numbers (if available), 3 email addresses, and company names” | resimpli.com/features/skip-tracing (opens in a new tab), checked |
| Land Portal | Up to 6 | Not stated in that article | “will include up to six phone numbers per contact” | help.landportal.com: how to bulk skip trace (opens in a new tab), checked |
Emails: up to 3, where the record has one
A skip trace can return email addresses alongside phones. A Skipmatch result has 3 email columns against 10 phone columns, so an owner can carry more phones than emails in one file. Emails are filled only where the record has them. None are guessed.
Phones and emails are separate: a row can come back with phones and no email, or with an email and no phone. A row with only an email still counts as a match, and its HitFlag reads HIT. Skipmatch publishes no share of rows that get an email, and this guide does not estimate one.
Why a record returns nothing
A row comes back empty when the records hold no phone and no email that can be tied to the owner on it. The row stays in your file, with HitFlag reading MISS. The usual causes:
- The owner is a company or trust. An LLC has no personal phone of its own; you trace the person behind it. See skip tracing LLC-owned property.
- The owner has died. The contact is now an heir or an executor, not the name on the deed. See finding heirs of a deceased owner.
- The name or mailing address is incomplete or out of date. A first initial, a missing mailing address or a years-old one gives the search less to match on.
- The owner has a thin record. Some people keep their numbers out of the records a skip trace draws on, and no service can return what is not there.
How often rows come back empty is a list's hit rate, and it varies by list. How to read one, and how to test two services fairly on the same file, is in how to judge a skip tracing service's hit rate. For what a skip trace is and where the data comes from, start with what is skip tracing and data sources.
Questions
How many phone numbers does a skip trace return?
Does skip tracing give email addresses?
What is the primary phone in a skip trace?
Why did my trace return no number?
Are all the numbers a skip trace returns current?
Price your list before you pay for it.
Create an account, upload the file, and see your total before you pay. Records with no phone and no email are never charged.