It can still be a shell built-in even when not documented:
~ (101) bash tom@vmw-debian7-64:~$ kill -l 1) SIGHUP 2) SIGINT 3) SIGQUIT 4) SIGILL 5) SIGTRAP 6) SIGABRT 7) SIGBUS 8) SIGFPE 9) SIGKILL 10) SIGUSR1 11) SIGSEGV 12) SIGUSR2 13) SIGPIPE 14) SIGALRM 15) SIGTERM 16) SIGSTKFLT 17) SIGCHLD 18) SIGCONT 19) SIGSTOP 20) SIGTSTP 21) SIGTTIN 22) SIGTTOU 23) SIGURG 24) SIGXCPU 25) SIGXFSZ 26) SIGVTALRM 27) SIGPROF 28) SIGWINCH 29) SIGIO 30) SIGPWR 31) SIGSYS 34) SIGRTMIN 35) SIGRTMIN+1 36) SIGRTMIN+2 37) SIGRTMIN+3 38) SIGRTMIN+4 39) SIGRTMIN+5 40) SIGRTMIN+6 41) SIGRTMIN+7 42) SIGRTMIN+8 43) SIGRTMIN+9 44) SIGRTMIN+10 45) SIGRTMIN+11 46) SIGRTMIN+12 47) SIGRTMIN+13 48) SIGRTMIN+14 49) SIGRTMIN+15 50) SIGRTMAX-14 51) SIGRTMAX-13 52) SIGRTMAX-12 53) SIGRTMAX-11 54) SIGRTMAX-10 55) SIGRTMAX-9 56) SIGRTMAX-8 57) SIGRTMAX-7 58) SIGRTMAX-6 59) SIGRTMAX-5 60) SIGRTMAX-4 61) SIGRTMAX-3 62) SIGRTMAX-2 63) SIGRTMAX-1 64) SIGRTMAX tom@vmw-debian7-64:~$ type kill kill is a shell builtin tom@vmw-debian7-64:~$
With fish:
tom@vmw-debian7-64:~$ fish Welcome to fish, the friendly interactive shell Type help for instructions on how to use fish tom@vmw-debian7-64 ~> kill -l HUP INT QUIT ILL TRAP ABRT BUS FPE KILL USR1 SEGV USR2 PIPE ALRM TERM STKFLT CHLD CONT STOP TSTP TTIN TTOU URG XCPU XFSZ VTALRM PROF WINCH POLL PWR SYS tom@vmw-debian7-64 ~> type kill kill is /bin/kill tom@vmw-debian7-64 ~>
With zsh
tom@vmw-debian7-64:~$ zsh vmw-debian7-64% kill -l HUP INT QUIT ILL TRAP ABRT BUS FPE KILL USR1 SEGV USR2 PIPE ALRM TERM STKFLT CHLD CONT STOP TSTP TTIN TTOU URG XCPU XFSZ VTALRM PROF WINCH POLL PWR SYS vmw-debian7-64% type kill kill is a shell builtin
With tcsh
tom@vmw-debian7-64:~$ tcsh ~ (101) kill -l HUP INT QUIT ILL TRAP ABRT BUS FPE KILL USR1 SEGV USR2 PIPE ALRM TERM STKFLT CHLD CONT STOP TSTP TTIN TTOU URG XCPU XFSZ VTALRM PROF WINCH POLL PWR SYS RTMIN RTMIN+1 RTMIN+2 RTMIN+3 RTMAX-3 RTMAX-2 RTMAX-1 RTMAX ~ (102) type kill type: Command not found. ~ (103) which kill kill: shell built-in command. ~ (104) which which which: shell built-in command.
It is a built-in for dash also, but the listing is a single column...
... RTMAX-8 RTMAX-7 RTMAX-6 RTMAX-5 RTMAX-4 RTMAX-3 RTMAX-2 RTMAX-1 RTMAX $ type kill kill is a shell builtin $ which kill /bin/kill $ /bin/kill -l HUP INT QUIT ILL TRAP ABRT BUS FPE KILL USR1 SEGV USR2 PIPE ALRM TERM STKFLT CHLD CONT STOP TSTP TTIN TTOU URG XCPU XFSZ VTALRM PROF WINCH POLL PWR SYS
I would get similar results for other systems (the nice thing about portable code). As for whereis, the manual page says
WHEREIS(1) User Commands WHEREIS(1) NAME whereis - locate the binary, source, and manual page files for a com‐ mand
note the binary (it does not try to look for shell built-ins or aliases).
killbuilting is documented in the bash man page.