How to Find Your Father This Father's Day

This article is written for anyone that wants to find their father by someone that found their father.

Whether it's an estranged father, a missing father or a deadbeat Dad take some advice from Mike and the Mechanics song "In the Living Years" . . .
So don't yield to the fortunes
You sometimes see as fate
It may have a new perspective
On a different day
And if you don't give up,
And don't give in
You may just be OK

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Courage
• Patience
• Determination
• Information

1. 
    
   Think About It

   Prepare for the outcome
   Prepare emotionally for the outcome realizing that finding your father may not be what was hoped for or expected. Make sure that anyone else impacted by the result, like mothers, and children, are emotionally prepared.
   Be prepared to spend time and money on the search to find father.

2. 
    
   Write It Down

   Collect and record information
   Solicit others to provide critical information like a social security number, last known address, phone numbers, places of employment, hobbies, member organizations, physical description, favorite foods, favorite colors and friends names. Addresses and phone numbers of the people who could provide further information should be recorded as well.

3. 
    
   Check It Out

   Start the search
   If possible, personally make follow-up phone calls, personally check out locations and personally look into getting records. Follow-up on each piece of information. One lead can lead to another. For example if an ex-boss said "I think he went to work at XYZ office", get the address and phone number of that office and call or visit.
   When the person's trail is dead, searching online can prove beneficial. Based on a test done by the Consumer Advisory Organization, Net Detective, Reverse Phone Detective and Complete Detective provide the best results and are used by law enforcement and private investigators.

4. 
    
   Possible happy ending

   Blog
   Some children have found their fathers through information gained by blogging. Blog on social websites like Facebook, Twitter and My Space asking for information. On the website www.43things.com people listed finding their father as a goal and were blogging about it.

Tips & Warnings

• During president Clinton's administration welfare mothers were required to provide father's names in order to receive benefits.
• Some states are legally required to provide names of new hires.
• Mail a letter to the last known address with the words "Do Not Forward - Address Correction Request".
• The slightest detail like favorite color can lead to the correct man.
• People searches on-line can cost money.
• According to the Consumer Advisory Organization over 80% of the people searches on-line like Google and Yahoo don't deliver accurate information.
• On-line people search results maybe out of date.
• Searches for biological fathers require additional preliminary research.

Resources

• Net Detective
• Reverse Phone Detective
• Complete Detective