We all know that feeling. You’re heading out of town — maybe to the village for a family wedding, or somewhere the signal is famously weak — and your mind starts doing the math on how many important calls you’ll miss while you’re gone. A friend of mine had a clever fix for this: whenever he travels, he quietly forwards his Telenor number to his brother’s phone. Two days later, zero missed calls, zero panicked call-backs. It’s a small trick, and it works surprisingly well.
That’s call forwarding. Your number stays the same, but the calls land on a different phone. Here’s everything you need to know to set it up on Telenor.
What Call Forwarding Actually Does
Most phones give you four ways to forward calls, and each one is useful in a different situation:
Forward all calls. Every incoming call goes straight to the other number. Your phone won’t ring at all. Handy when your SIM is in a phone you’re not carrying, or when you want a complete break.
Forward when busy. Only kicks in when you’re already on a call. The second caller gets sent to the other number instead of hearing “busy”. Good if you’re on the phone all day for work.
Forward when you don’t answer. Your phone rings normally for a while, and if you don’t pick up, the call jumps to the other number. This is the one most people actually want — it’s a safety net, not a full handover.
Forward when unreachable. This one is gold for travelers. If your phone is switched off or you’re out of coverage, calls go straight to the other number. Anyone who’s driven through the motorway dead zones knows exactly why this exists.
When Forwarding Is Actually Worth Using
Let’s be honest — you don’t need this every day. But there are a few situations where it genuinely saves the day:
- Traveling to a weak-signal area. If your own number goes silent for a day, forward to someone you’re with. And if the coverage at your destination worries you in general, it’s worth reading up on how to improve your Telenor signal before you leave.
- Two phones, one you. Plenty of people carry a work phone and a personal phone. Forward one to the other and stop carrying both everywhere.
- Battery running low. No charger around? Forward to a family member’s phone so you don’t miss anything urgent.
- Dual SIM juggling. If you use two SIMs and one sits idle most of the time, forwarding keeps both numbers reachable without constant SIM swapping.
One caveat: forwarding sends the call onward, but it doesn’t move your SMS or missed-call alerts with it. The person receiving the forwarded call won’t know it was meant for you unless you tell them.
How to Set It Up on Android
The easiest way to set up forwarding needs no codes at all — Android has it built right into the phone app. The exact menu names vary a little between Samsung, Xiaomi, Infinix, and other brands, but the path is almost always the same:
- Open the Phone app (the dialer, not your contacts list).
- Tap the three dots menu in the corner, then Settings.
- Look for Call settings or Supplementary services, then Call forwarding.
- You’ll see the four options: Always forward, Forward when busy, Forward when unanswered, and Forward when unreachable.
- Tap the one you want, type in the full number (start with 03, like 03451234567), and tap Enable or Turn on.
Your phone will confirm with a small message like “Call forwarding enabled”. That’s it — the network does the rest.
If the “Call forwarding” menu asks for a password or says the option isn’t available, don’t worry. Some settings come from the SIM itself rather than the phone, which is where operator dial codes come in — more on those below.
How to Set It Up on iPhone
Apple keeps this simpler, but also more limited:
- Go to Settings, then Phone.
- Tap Call Forwarding and switch it on.
- Enter the number you want calls to go to.
That’s the whole story on iPhone — you get the “always forward” option through settings. For the conditional types (busy, no answer, unreachable), iPhone users need the operator’s dial codes, so read the next section.
What About the Dial Codes?
You’ve probably seen lists of short codes online for activating and cancelling forwarding — the star-and-hash kind you dial like a phone number. Operators do provide these, and they let you turn forwarding on or off in seconds without digging through menus.
Here’s the thing: these codes can change, and blogs love posting outdated ones. I’m not going to give you a code here that I can’t personally verify today. The safest move is to check the current forwarding codes inside the My Telenor App (check the help or services section), or just call the Telenor helpline on 345 and ask — it takes two minutes and you’ll get the exact, current codes for your SIM type. And if you’re dealing with anything else call-related while you’re at it, it’s a good moment to look over your current Telenor call packages too, since forwarded calls do interact with your minutes.
How to Turn Call Forwarding Off
This is the part people forget, and then wonder why their phone never rings. To switch forwarding off, go back to the same menu where you turned it on — the Phone app’s call forwarding settings on Android, or Settings → Phone → Call Forwarding on iPhone — and disable it. Double-check that all four options are off, not just the one you set. You don’t want to spend a week thinking your phone is broken when calls are quietly going to someone else’s pocket.
A Few Things Worth Knowing First
Forwarded calls cost you, not the caller. When a call forwards, your number technically makes a second, outgoing call to the other number. So the forwarding leg uses your balance or your call minutes. Make sure you have enough — and if you’re unsure how much you have, first find your own Telenor SIM number and check your remaining balance before setting this up.
Type the number carefully. One wrong digit and your calls go to a stranger. After enabling forwarding, call your own number from a friend’s phone and see where it lands. Thirty seconds of testing saves a lot of confusion.
It works on Wi-Fi too — sort of. If your phone is on Wi-Fi calling, forwarding settings still apply. But if the phone is fully off, only the “forward when unreachable” type will catch the call.
You can forward to any number. Landline, another Telenor number, even a different network. Just remember the cost point above — forwarding to another network doesn’t cost the caller anything extra, but your outgoing leg is billed at your normal rate.
That’s really all there is to it. Call forwarding is one of those quietly useful features that sits in your phone for years without you ever touching it — until the one day you actually need it, and then you’re glad you knew where the setting lives. Set it before your next trip, test it once, and turn it off when you’re back. And while you’re thinking about calls, try today’s Telenor quiz on the homepage — takes two minutes and the MBs are a nice little bonus.
