A receiving device in a trunked radio communications system retrieves a first frequency, wherein the first frequency relates to a lowest frequency that the at least one repeater utilizes for transmission and tunes to about the first frequency. If no control channel messages are decoded at the first frequency, then the receiving device tunes to about a second frequency wherein the second frequency is a channel separation of 12.5 kHz from the first frequency. If no control channel messages are decoded at the second frequency, then the receiving device, iteratively increments the second frequency by the channel separation until the second frequency reaches an end of band frequency for the trunked radio communications system.