Press Office

"Solus" Viewing Cards Statement

February 2004

As you may know, in May last year, the BBC decided to move their broadcast services from the Astra 2A satellite to the Astra 2D satellite and to enable consumers to receive BBC services "in the clear" - without the need for a viewing card. However, this new agreement ended payment by the BBC to BSkyB for the provision of "Solus" viewing cards to digital satellite viewers who do not have a subscription to a pay-TV service. A side effect of this decision placed future access to the free-to-view commercial channels (ITV, Channel 4 and Five) on the satellite platform in some doubt as they were unable to ensure sufficient funds could be found to bridge the substantial financial gap. BSkyB were not prepared to fund supplying new viewing cards to "Solus" card viewers - unless a free-to-view broadcaster, other than the BBC, agreed to pay for replacement cards.

In October, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport announced that following some intense and lengthy negotiations between ITV, Channel 4, Five and BSkyB a resolution to the matter had now been agreed. The agreement enabled consumers to continue receiving the commercially funded public service channels on a free-to view basis. It covered all the digital satellite consumers who did not have a subscription to a pay-tv service (whether they had since the beginning chosen to be free-to-view consumers ("Solus" card viewers) or had stopped subscribing to BSkyB (churners).

The thrust of the deal involved existing "Solus" card holders (and churners) being offered new cards for a one-off purchase cost of £20 (plus VAT). The new cards were guaranteed until the end of December 2005. However, this deal was only available until 31 st January 2004 and the option of receiving ITV, Channel 4 and Five through digital satellite equipment without subscription is no longer available. The cost of funding the cards was met by ITV, Channel 4 and Five and was only intended to be available to those viewers who were about to lose their free to view channels. Therefore the option to purchase viewing cards was only available for a limited time.

Existing free to view satellite customers were informed through on screen messages on the affected channels. The department wrote a letter explaining the situation and how to purchase a card, to all MP's and members of the public that contacted us and we also put a statement up on our digital television website, which included the last date the cards could be purchased.

We understand that the broadcasters have no current plans to provide solus cards to new satellite customers. However, the Government remains committed to ensuring that analogue terrestrial broadcasting signals are maintained until everyone who can currently get the main public service broadcasting channels (BBC1 and 2, ITV1, Channel 4/S4C and Five) can receive them free-to-view via at least one of the digital platforms.

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