# Sending Special Characters

There are some special characters that are used by the XML syntax. If used within elements and attributes they needed to be escaped or encapsulated. There a 2 ways to handle these.

Not all special characters are allowed. Please refer to the [XML schema files](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/xml_schema_files_xsds/) for more information.

## Replacing characters

The preferred method is to replace these by the corresponding XML notation:

| Character | XML notation |
|  --- | --- |
| `<` | `&lt;` |
| `>` | `&gt;` |
| `&` | `&amp;` |
| `"` | `&quot;` |
| `'` | `&apos;` |


Most frameworks do this replacement automatically.

Example for article-description “Black & White”:


```xml  
<item article-number="1">
      quantity="2"  
      unit-price-gross="17.40"  
      tax-rate="19">Black &amp; white</item>
```

## Using CDATA

As an alternative you can encapsulate the element with `<![CDATA[ ... ]]>`.

Example for article-description “Black & White”


```xml  
<item article-number="1">
      quantity="2"  
      unit-price-gross="17.40"  
      tax-rate="19"><![CDATA[Black & White]]></item>
```

**Note:** This only works within elements, not within attributes.

Don't use CDATA for [credentials](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/head/credential).

## Handling of umlauts

Umlauts have to be sent as they are (ä, ö, ...). **Escaping for these characters is not recommended.**

If an escaping is necessary for some reason, please use UTF-8 escaping.

**Examples**

| Character | Decimal | Hexadecimal |
|  --- | --- | --- |
| `ü` | `&#252;` | `&#xFC;` |
| `Ü` | `&#220;` | `&#xDC;` |
| `ö` | `&#246;` | `&#xF6;` |
| `Ö` | `&#214;` | `&#xD6;` |
| ... | ... | ... |


**Please do not use HTML escaping** (`&uuml;` for `ü`). HTML escaping will cause type mismatches and encoding errors.