diff --git a/basket/sendbasket.pl b/basket/sendbasket.pl
index 3f57de2d14..885ee41a78 100755
--- a/basket/sendbasket.pl
+++ b/basket/sendbasket.pl
@@ -131,8 +131,9 @@ if ( $email_add ) {
     }
 
     if ( $template_res =~ /<MESSAGE>(.*)<END_MESSAGE>/s ) {
-        $body = encode_qp($1);
+        $body = $1;
         $body =~ s|\n?(.*)\n?|$1|;
+        $body = encode("UTF-8", encode_qp($body));
     }
 
     my $boundary = "====" . time() . "====";