diff --git a/scripting/source/pyprov/mailmerge.py b/scripting/source/pyprov/mailmerge.py
index 4654ad3..1e6c6e7 100755
--- a/scripting/source/pyprov/mailmerge.py
+++ b/scripting/source/pyprov/mailmerge.py
@@ -148,7 +148,7 @@ class PyMailSMTPService(unohelper.Base, XSmtpService):
 					textbody = textbody.value
 				except:
 					pass
-				textbody = textbody.encode('utf-8')
+				textbody = unicode.encode(textbody, 'utf-8')
 
 				if len(textbody):
 					mimeEncoding = re.sub("charset=.*", "charset=UTF-8", flavor.MimeType)