Presence lite

A service is provided to cell phone subscribers to improve reachability. A home location register node maintains state information on a subscriber's cell phone status. Cell phone status information includes: off; on, registered and available to receive calls; on, registered but busy participating in an ongoing call; on, registered but temporarily unavailable; and on, registered but unattended. Temporarily unavailable is further qualified: poor reception location, high interference, cell throughput saturation, intentional user disposition. Long term unavailability may also be inferred and indicated depending on the device and/or system status. When a call to a subscriber's cell phone cannot be completed or is not answered, the service annunciates the reason to the calling party. The calling party can then make a more informed decision as to when to reattempt the call and is more likely to reattempt the call. The service is provided in conjunction with call forwarding to landlines phones and/or voicemail.