Need help getting handoff and continuity working on iPhone 6 and iPAd

Hi there Jfalzon82,

Welcome to Apple Support Communities.

It sounds like you’re running into an issue setting up Continuity with your iPhone 6 Plus and iPad mini, and you’re wondering if you need a Mac to setup them up properly. You don’t need a Mac. Take a look at the article linked below which will walk you through the process of setting up Continuity on your devices.

Connect your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Mac using Continuity - Apple Support

Phone calls

With Continuity, you can make and receive cellular phone calls from your iPad, iPod touch, or Mac when your iPhone is on the same Wi-Fi network.

To make and receive phone calls, here's what you need:

1. Sign in to the same iCloud account on all your devices, including your Mac.
2. Your iPhone and your iPad or iPod touch need to use iOS 8 or later. Your Mac needs to use OS X Yosemite.
3. All devices must be on the same Wi-Fi network.
4. All devices must be signed in to FaceTime using the same iCloud account. This means any device that shares your Apple ID will get your phone calls. Look below for instructions on how to turn off iPhone cellular calls.
5. Wi-Fi Calling needs to be off. Go to Settings > Phone. If you see Wi-Fi Calling, turn it off.

To use Continuity for SMS and MMS with your iPhone and your Mac, iPad or iPod touch

• Your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch need to use iOS 8.1, and your Mac needs to use OS X Yosemite.
• Sign in to iMessage on your iPhone, your other iOS devices, and your Mac using the same Apple ID.
• On your iPhone:
  1. Go to Settings > Messages > Send & Receive > You Can Be Reached By, and add a check to both your phone number and email address.
  2. Go to Messages > Text Message Forwarding, and enable the device(s) you would like to forward messages to.

Your Mac, iPad, or iPod touch will display a code. Enter this code on your iPhone to verify the SMS feature.

So long,

-Jason

I had a similar issue with my txt message forwarding, except when I flipped the switch in Text Message Forwarding to allow text messages to my iPad, it would not send a code to my iPad. My solution was I turned off iMessage on my iPhone then turned it back on again, I flipped the switch to allow text message again to send the code to my iPad and it worked. Just had to repeat that process twice. I'm also using an iPhone 6, with my first gen iPad Mini, both on iOS 8.3. Figure it may be a small glitch now that first gens are considered old.