Linking your phone number to your National Identity Number is no longer a whim – if you fail to do it before the end of the year, you risk losing access to mobile services from your SIM card. Here is why exactly you should do it and how to do it the right way.
Find your new mobile phone among over 38,000 offers on Jiji
1. Why should you link your phone number to your NIN?
Last week, the Nigerian Communications Commission announced that Nigerians had only two weeks to link their phone numbers to their National Identity Numbers. The deadline for this is December 31, 2020. After that, all mobile phone numbers that are not yet linked to their owners’ NINs will be blocked. The good news is that you can link more than one phone number to the same NIN, but you have to act quickly, as there are only 10 days left until the deadline.
Read more: How To Check Your National Identification Number (NIN) And Card Verification
2. How to link your mobile number to your NIN
To date, all major Nigerian service providers have designed the procedures for their subscribers to link their NIN and phone numbers. Here are the steps you need to take with each service provider.
1. Airtel
- Dial *121# from the mobile phone with an Airtel number you want to link to your NIN.
- Type 1, which corresponds to the “NIN Capture” menu item and tap Send.
- Enter the 11 digits of your NIN and tap Send.
- If everything goes right, you will receive a message confirming that your number is now linked to your NIN.
Read more: How To Transfer Airtime From Any Network To Another Network e.g MTN To Airtel
2. MTN
- Dial *785# from the mobile phone with an MTN subscription you want to link to your NIN.
- Follow the instructions in the response and enter your 11 digits of NIN, then tap Send.
- Alternatively, you can simply dial *785*NIN# and tap Send. In that case, your number will be linked to your NIN automatically and you will receive a confirmation message soon afterwards.
- MTN also allows you to link the two numbers on the company’s official website at https://mtnonline.com/nin/. You will need to enter your name and email along with phone number and NIN.
3. Glo
On Glo network, you can register your NIN via SMS. Simply text “UpdateNIN NIN First Name Last Name” to 109. Your text should look like this: “UpdateNIN 92819484561 Abiola Uchendu”. If you do everything correctly, you will receive a confirmation message shortly after.
Read more: Full List Of Latest Internet Data Costs In Nigeria! MTN, Airtel, Glo And Others!
4. 9mobile
9mobile also did not stand aside from the new regulations. The provider allocated a separate number for all of NIN-related inquiries. To check your NIN status, dial *346# from your phone and follow the instructions. It can also turn out that your NIN is already linked to your number, in which case you can safely continue using your 9mobile phone number.
Buy and sell with confidence from your phone using the Jiji app
