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Updated April 2008

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INFORMATION

Introduction to watching UK TV in France

Unlike in the United Kingdom, if you wish to receive British television in France, you need to receive it via satellite using a digital decoder (récepteur satellite numérique) and a satellite dish (parabole).

Your satellite dish will need to point towards the Astra2 satellite system.

There are two types of digital decoder:

• A standard decoder available in France. These can be obtained at a reasonable cost from any DIY shop and will enable you to view all the channels that are ‘free to air’ which includes all the standard BBC TV channels and to listen to BBC radio. It will not allow you to view any ‘scrambled’ channels such as ITV1, ITV2, Channel4 and Channel5. The very cheap decoders have limited functionality and can be difficult to use.
• A Sky digital decoder (digi box) will enable you to view, without charge or subscription, all the BBC TV channels, ITV 3, over one hundred radio stations, Sky news, Euronews, children’s BBC, and lots of other free channels you wont believe exist! The sky digi box also gives you extra functions such as a full program guide to what’s on, and options to automatically switch to chosen programmes.

Should you require ITV1, ITV2, Channels 4 and 5, it will be necessary to obtain a freesat card to place for your digi box. This is a one off payment card, not a subscription and will last for roughly three years.

Similarly you will need a card if you want any subscription channels (films, sport, etc)

If you have a Sky digi box in England and a holiday home in France you can bring it with you for your holidays – you’ll just need to install a satellite dish (it’s not recommended to bring this with you!).

The digi box is placed by your television and connected to it be either a coax cable or a ‘scart’ cable, and to the satellite dish by a satellite quality coax cable. You can also connect your decoder to an amplifier using standard audio cables to listenm to the radio. The satellite dish will be placed on your wall, roof or even at times, on a pole in the garden! This may be because it is difficult to have line of sight of the satellite which is very low in the sky and so, if you have large trees obscuring the view, it may be necessary to place the dish in an rather bizarre position in order to receive the signal.

On the whole, satellite television is pretty trouble free. However, adverse weather conditions can affect the picture, which can either freeze or break into pixels (tiny squares). This can happen if there is a storm or a very heavy downpour of rain and the best action is to turn off the television and wait for it to pass.

So, no need for you to miss your favourite programmes just because you live in France. Happy Viewing!!