3675241 - Email Subject Displays Encoded Text (e.g., =?iso-8859-1?Q?...?=) When Umlauts or Special Characters Are Present

• Umlauts such as Ä, Ö, etc., are being altered in the subject line of incoming emails in SAP Service Cloud Version 2.
• Users experience additional effort in manually correcting the subject line for each email.

• SAP Service Cloud Version 2
• SAP Sales Cloud Version 2

1. Send an email to the inbound technical address containing umlauts or special characters in the subject, for example: Subject: Wärmepumpe ThermoFlow.
2. Observe that, after processing, the subject in the system displays as: =?iso-8859-1?Q?W=E4rmepumpe_ThermoFlow?=

• Email subjects containing non-ASCII characters (such as Ä, Ö, Ü, or ß) are often encoded using MIME encoded-word syntax to preserve special characters during transmission.
• For example:
  • =?iso-8859-1?Q?Pr=FCfung_erforderlich?= -> represents “Prüfung erforderlich.”
  • If this header is not decoded correctly before reaching the SAP inbound email interface, the encoded value is displayed literally in the system.
  • This typically happens when: 
    • The mail gateway or forwarding system re-encodes or rewrites headers;
    • The character set conversion (e.g., ISO-8859-1 → UTF-8) is not correctly handled; or
    • The subject decoding is not performed prior to delivery to SAP.

• Customers must ensure that the subject line is correctly decoded before the email reaches SAP Service Cloud.
  • To resolve this issue:
    • Verify mail flow configuration: 
      • Check whether emails are being forwarded or relayed through internal or external systems (e.g., Microsoft Exchange, Postfix, or other MTAs). 
    • Inspect the MIME headers:
      • Open the original .eml file of the affected email.
      • If the Subject: line already appears encoded (for example, =?iso-8859-1?Q?...?=), this indicates that decoding has not occurred upstream.
    • Adjust mail system settings
      • Ensure that header decoding or charset conversion occurs before the message is forwarded to SAP.
      • Use UTF-8 as the preferred encoding standard for all outgoing or relayed messages.
    • Validate with test messages:
      • Send a test email containing umlauts or accented characters directly to the inbound address to confirm that the subject is displayed correctly.
• Additional Information, about MIME Encoding: 
  • Email headers that include special characters use the following format: =?charset?encoding?encoded-text?=
    • Where:
      • charset = Character set used (e.g., iso-8859-1 or utf-8)
      • encoding = Type of encoding, typically Q (quoted-printable) or B (base64)
      • encoded-text = Encoded representation of the characters
    • Example: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Pr=FCfung_erforderlich?= → Prüfung erforderlich
      • Ensuring that the email system decodes or converts the headers prior to forwarding guarantees correct display in SAP Service Cloud.

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