British Television Abroad - Information for Expats living in Europe

If you live in Europe and want a sky subscription viewing card, but don't have a UK address we can help. Our sky subscription viewing card for expats, is an arrangement service, we can provide you both freesat and subscription viewing cards. 

On this page you will find a selection of products and further down the page is technical information. Be sure to check out our hyperlinks to get even more information and advice. Larger dishes for example are not exclusive for Sky and can be found in the menu bar on the left hand side. 

If you want to read more about the viewing card or to purchase the viewing card without a digibox then please click here.

These receivers are not recommended in fringe areas 
Pace 2500s (Ziff Tuner) 
Panasonic TU-DSB 31
Sony Receivers

Complimentary Information for expats living abroad in Europe and wishing to take up sky digitals subscription channels or free to view and free to air channels.

For expats or people wishing to view English language television from the Sky Digital platform across Europe - this page in intended as notes to help you make an informed choice about which equipment to buy and what sky digital satellite television services you may expect to view, with or without a sky digibox. Most people associate English television from UK with Sky Television and because the majority of the UK English channels are grouped amongst the packages for sky TV, it does for our purposes make it much simpler to explain, and is also the reason that the most comprehensive electronic program guide for UK satellite television is generally that of the digibox.

Often confusion surrounds the costs associated with satellite TV, people are often discouraged by thinking they will need to take out a subscription, but this is not the case.

There is 3 levels of encryption associated with Sky Digital :-
1)  FTA (Free to Air) - no card required, can be viewed with digibox or normal DVB digital satellite receiver 
2)  FTV (Free to View) - can only be viewed with a Sky Digibox, requires a card but not a subscription
3) Subscription Channels (Sky) - can only be viewed with a Sky Digibox, and a valid subscription

The channels which can be viewed in the three categories above are listed on our channels page.  If you have not looked and are not aware of what channels can be viewed with or without a subscription then please do so.

Next you need to determine if you can receive the channels, and for this purpose you need to consider that the Sky Digital platform broadcasts from a constellation of satellites co-located at 28.2E, you will need a clear line of site to this orbital position and then you'll need to assess what size of dish you will require.   This is determined by the signal strength of the broadcast signal and whether you are inside the footprint or not - if not, then you cannot receive Sky Digital UK TV. Since there is more than one satellite to consider, a footprint map of the weakest satellite Astra2d  is shown below. This should be the basis for your choice of dish size in order to maximise the available channels. This map is an overview, local advice is always the best policy, although adhering to the sizes in the map will normally in 99% of cases result in success. 

Whilst the footprint map gives a reasonable overview of the dish sizes required it should be noted that "hot" spots occur, in these locations it may be possible to receive the signal with a smaller dish. The hot spots come from what's known as "side lobes", and are reported to exist in "The Algarve" Portugal 80cm,  "The Costa-del-Sol", Spain 1.2m and the "Boot" of Italy 90cm. At the same time conversely there are also "cold" spots or exceptions: Alicante 2.4m, Canary Isles 300cm, Portugal 180cm and Costa Brava 180cm. Users in Cyprus should consult local installers for the best sized dish since there are very large variations in quality and signal strength over very short distances whilst a user in one address may be fine with a 3m dish, 200m away a neighbour may need a 4m dish, since large dishes are both costly and unsightly you are advised to consult locally for the best dish to suit your needs. 

We recommend you go to a local satellite installer for the dish and installation, whilst you can do it yourself, it can be very tricky and complex without experience for large dishes DIY installation is rarely possible, in most cases you need  high quality signal spectrum analysers or full programmable digital meters. If you want Sky + then you'll need to request at minimum a  twin output LNB and the associated cabling.

Now you'll need a receiver, and for this you will need to decide between a budget FTA receiver, or dedicated digibox for FTV and subscription channels. 

How to get a Sky Digibox, as an individual you will need a UK address, and UK bank account, you can get a subsidised normal or Sky+  digibox  (but not a Multiroom Discount) receiver from Sky and have it delivered to the UK address for DIY installation. You will need to call from the UK to do this, otherwise you will need to purchase a contract free digibox.

If you obtain a subsidised digibox you will need to honour the requirement of connecting the telephone line to the digibox and for this purpose you'll need a digibox dialler.  

If you already have the equipment and it is not subject to any telephone connection then for the FTV channels you'll need either a FreeView* Satellite Card or sky digital subscription card (*not to be confused with Freeview Terrestrial UK non-satellite services).

 If you need either of these then we can assist -  contact us   

If you already have a viewing card, digibox and subscription then providing you don't use multiroom discount then you probably only need installation of a suitable sized dish, if you need help finding an installer, we can recommend installers in Portugal, Spain, and  Cyprus (UK Military Only). We can also help obtain a dish for you and are able to source dishes up to 4.80m in size. You should change your subscription address to one of a friend or relative in the UK and everything will become straightforward.

If you don't wish the hassle, or cannot get a useable UK address  providing you have any valid credit card, or a UK bank account suitable for direct debits, we can provide you with a Sky Digital subscription  with any digibox you purchase from us. We used to provide this service without charging an annual fee, however big changes in Sky have resulted in the need for us to apply annual fees and other charges - we regret this, it is beyond our control.  

If you already have a digibox but cannot get a viewing card because you live overseas then we can still help, for a broker fee of £100 / €150  we will supply you with a viewing card subscription. The subsequent broker charges are £70 / €105 per year.  If however you have a UK address and can have mail forwarded from that address, please contact us we can provide you free options for obtaining your card. 

IRISH SKY £100 / €150   UK SKY £100 / €150

Viewing card* without digibox

12 months minimum

• subscription price is that of Sky's advertised pricing and packages no need for a UK address or UK bank account (foreign credit cards OK)

•  Low Annual fee  £70 / €105 

• Sky will debit from your credit card directly (or UK account if you have one)

• order a dialler if you wish PPV  Box Office movies (avoid sky's service charge)

• if we 'lend' you the card, you must agree to subscribe for 12 months

Multi-room discount is not available with this offer. Other terms apply for traders wishing to offer this for their own clients.

• contact us if you have further questions

If you want to read more about the viewing card or to purchase the viewing card without a digibox then please click here.

Freeview and Subscription Card Activations (normal process - excludes our service)

When you receive a new Viewing Card, the letter that comes with it says that the viewing card will activate all by itself in your digibox. In the UK, Sky expect a digibox to be connected to a telephone line and as soon as you insert a new card, the modem inside the digibox tries to phone back to Sky. Once connected, the digibox will automatically transfer its version and serial number along with the number of the card and that will trigger an Over The Air activation signal.  (of course you can also phone sky with the information, there is a slight risk to this - so we can suggest have a friend call from the UK, you will need the  card number, digibox epg version number, serial number and digibox version number - this is found in the services menu - a manual activation can take up to 72hrs).

For subscription cards the same process applies (unless you have a subsidised contract box - in which case you will need a dialler).

We hope this assists you and welcome any comments for improvement, whilst we do make money from the products we sell, our advice and information on these pages is free, we hope it is informative and educational - and endeavour to keep it accurate.

Recent Changes

Newsflash: the sky digidialler product has been reduced in cost by over 50% we now only offer trade discounts from 10% on this product (previous trade discount was over 50%)

In response to our customers feedback prices have been updated to include Euros, we listen to our customers and act upon the feedback received. We are also undertaking to update our faq pages to include specific troubleshooting information but naturally this may take a little time, however we will answer questions to the best of our ability and use this to update our site. We plan to introduce some further price cuts and other payment options as well as an expansion of digibox receiver models stocked, we have also changed our delivery prices. The live operator feedback box  was added April 2007. Annual fees were regrettably introduced due to difficulties in getting cards from the UK.

More Resources on our site. We want to help you get more out of your system setup, check the links below then contact us if you have questions about Sky Plus, TV Link or even channel line ups.

link - Programming your Sky Remote Control with your television codes.

link - Sky Packages a quick overview on subscription types.

link - Frequently asked questions about sky digital including sky plus.

link - Channel Line up for sky digital English Television from the United Kingdom

link - How we manage your subscription for you.

Site Improvement or queries.

we welcome your suggestions and will try our best to update this site as much as possible, if you didn't find what you wanted or you wish some further information please complete the form below you can leave the anonymous fields as they are if you don't want us to respond to you.