diff -Naur fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/driver.c fetchmail-5.9.6/driver.c
--- fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/driver.c	Fri Dec 14 08:36:01 2001
+++ fetchmail-5.9.6/driver.c	Fri Jan  4 19:14:17 2002
@@ -788,10 +788,7 @@
 
 	/* try to clean up all streams */
 	release_sink(ctl);
-	if (ctl->smtp_socket != -1) {
-	    cleanupSockClose(ctl->smtp_socket);
-	    ctl->smtp_socket = -1;
-	}
+	smtp_close(ctl);
 	if (mailserver_socket != -1) {
 	    cleanupSockClose(mailserver_socket);
 	    mailserver_socket = -1;
diff -Naur fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/fetchmail.h fetchmail-5.9.6/fetchmail.h
--- fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/fetchmail.h	Fri Dec 14 13:20:01 2001
+++ fetchmail-5.9.6/fetchmail.h	Fri Jan  4 19:16:04 2002
@@ -462,6 +462,7 @@
 int interruptible_idle(int interval);
 
 /* sink.c: forwarding */
+void smtp_close(struct query *);
 int smtp_open(struct query *);
 int stuffline(struct query *, char *);
 int open_sink(struct query*, struct msgblk *, int*, int*);
diff -Naur fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/imap.c fetchmail-5.9.6/imap.c
--- fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/imap.c	Thu Jan  3 18:01:30 2002
+++ fetchmail-5.9.6/imap.c	Fri Jan  4 19:13:00 2002
@@ -508,6 +508,7 @@
 	/* this is a while loop because imap_idle() might return on other
 	 * mailbox changes also */
 	while (recentcount == 0 && do_idle) {
+	    smtp_close(ctl);
 	    ok = imap_idle(sock);
 	    if (ok)
 	    {
diff -Naur fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/sink.c fetchmail-5.9.6/sink.c
--- fetchmail-5.9.6.orig/sink.c	Fri Dec 14 14:21:24 2001
+++ fetchmail-5.9.6/sink.c	Fri Jan  4 19:15:59 2002
@@ -46,18 +46,25 @@
 /* makes the open_sink()/close_sink() pair non-reentrant */
 static int lmtp_responses;
 
+void smtp_close(struct query *ctl)
+/* close the socket to SMTP server */
+{
+    if (ctl->smtp_socket != -1)
+    {
+	SockClose(ctl->smtp_socket);
+	ctl->smtp_socket = -1;
+    }
+    batchcount = 0;
+}
+
 int smtp_open(struct query *ctl)
 /* try to open a socket to the appropriate SMTP server for this query */ 
 {
     char *parsed_host = NULL;
 
     /* maybe it's time to close the socket in order to force delivery */
-    if (NUM_NONZERO(ctl->batchlimit) && (ctl->smtp_socket != -1) && ++batchcount == ctl->batchlimit)
-    {
-	SockClose(ctl->smtp_socket);
-	ctl->smtp_socket = -1;
-	batchcount = 0;
-    }
+    if (NUM_NONZERO(ctl->batchlimit) && ++batchcount == ctl->batchlimit)
+	smtp_close(ctl);
 
     /* if no socket to any SMTP host is already set up, try to open one */
     if (ctl->smtp_socket == -1) 
@@ -146,8 +153,7 @@
 	     * RFC 1869 warns that some listeners hang up on a failed EHLO,
 	     * so it's safest not to assume the socket will still be good.
 	     */
-	    SockClose(ctl->smtp_socket);
-	    ctl->smtp_socket = -1;
+	    smtp_close(ctl);
 
 	    /* if opening for ESMTP failed, try SMTP */
 	    if ((ctl->smtp_socket = SockOpen(parsed_host,portnum,NULL,
@@ -158,8 +164,7 @@
 		    SMTP_helo(ctl->smtp_socket, id_me) == SM_OK)
 		break;  /* success */
 
-	    SockClose(ctl->smtp_socket);
-	    ctl->smtp_socket = -1;
+	    smtp_close(ctl);
 	}
 	set_timeout(0);
 	phase = oldphase;