A method and system to determine when a wireless terminal has been paged by a servicing base station. An encoded paging burst is received on a paging channel and then decoded to produce a decoded paging burst. The decoded paging burst is processed to determine if it is a null page. When the encoded paging burst is a null page, it is processed to produce a null page pattern. The wireless terminal may then enter a sleep mode or reduced functionality mode for a predetermined period of time. The wireless terminal awakes from the sleep mode to receive additional encoded paging bursts. Processing the additional encoded paging bursts produces a processed encoded paging burst, which is compared to the null page pattern. When compared favorably, the encoded paging burst is considered a null page, allowing the wireless terminal to re-enter the sleep mode without fully decoding the paging burst.