diff --git a/lib/email/receiver.rb b/lib/email/receiver.rb
index c644950cee4..c15f8c42739 100644
--- a/lib/email/receiver.rb
+++ b/lib/email/receiver.rb
@@ -95,6 +95,7 @@ module Email
 
     def parse_body(message)
       body = select_body message
+      encoding = body.encoding
       raise EmptyEmailError if body.strip.blank?
 
       body = discourse_email_trimmer body
@@ -103,7 +104,7 @@ module Email
       body = EmailReplyParser.parse_reply body
       raise EmptyEmailError if body.strip.blank?
 
-      body
+      body.force_encoding(encoding).encode("UTF-8")
     end
 
     def select_body(message)
diff --git a/spec/components/email/receiver_spec.rb b/spec/components/email/receiver_spec.rb
index c5ef25543ec..a0431606773 100644
--- a/spec/components/email/receiver_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/components/email/receiver_spec.rb
@@ -45,14 +45,14 @@ describe Email::Receiver do
       I18n.expects(:t).with('user_notifications.previous_discussion').returns('כלטוב')
 
       # The force_encoding call is only needed for the test - it is passed on fine to the cooked post
-      test_parse_body(fixture_file("emails/hebrew.eml")).force_encoding("UTF-8").should == "שלום"
+      test_parse_body(fixture_file("emails/hebrew.eml")).should == "שלום"
     end
 
     it "supports a BIG5-encoded reply" do
       I18n.expects(:t).with('user_notifications.previous_discussion').returns('媽！我上電視了！')
 
       # The force_encoding call is only needed for the test - it is passed on fine to the cooked post
-      test_parse_body(fixture_file("emails/big5.eml")).force_encoding("UTF-8").should == "媽！我上電視了！"
+      test_parse_body(fixture_file("emails/big5.eml")).should == "媽！我上電視了！"
     end
 
     it "removes 'via' lines if they match the site title" do
@@ -77,6 +77,16 @@ it there without worrying about it too much, imo.
 Thanks for listening."
       )
     end
+
+    it "converts back to UTF-8 at the end" do
+      result = test_parse_body(fixture_file("emails/big5.eml"))
+      result.encoding.should == Encoding::UTF_8
+
+      # should not throw
+      TextCleaner.normalize_whitespaces(
+          test_parse_body(fixture_file("emails/big5.eml"))
+      )
+    end
   end
 
   describe "posting replies" do