Character Set Encoding and external reporting tools

Hi,

It seems that RT3 saves all text in UTF-8 encoding in the database. On my
current installation, mySQL is the database and it is not aware (and does
not support this yet, until 4.1, I think) that the data is encoded as UTF-8.

When using various reporting tool, such as plain SQL, Crystal Reports
(myODBC), Access (myODBC) or other, the special characters remain encoded.

Is there anyone using external tools for reporting from RT?

How is this UTF-8 encoding for special characters dealt with?

Any recommendations on dealing with this?

Thanks in advance,

Real