diff --git a/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/Configuration.java b/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/Configuration.java
index 3737ba451..e212310ba 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/Configuration.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/Configuration.java
@@ -64,7 +64,7 @@ public class Configuration {
   // various
   private String timezone = null;
   private String connectionTimeZone = null;
-  private boolean forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession = true;
+  private Boolean forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession = null;
   private boolean preserveInstants;
   private Boolean autocommit = null;
   private boolean useMysqlMetadata = false;
@@ -1600,7 +1600,7 @@ public String connectionTimeZone() {
    *
    * @return forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession
    */
-  public boolean forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession() {
+  public Boolean forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession() {
     return forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession;
   }
 
diff --git a/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/client/impl/StandardClient.java b/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/client/impl/StandardClient.java
index aeb73bbc2..a2f29253b 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/client/impl/StandardClient.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/mariadb/jdbc/client/impl/StandardClient.java
@@ -768,7 +768,7 @@ public String createSessionVariableQuery(Context context) {
     }
 
     // force client timezone to connection to ensure result of now(), ...
-    if (conf.forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession()) {
+    if (conf.forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession() == null || conf.forceConnectionTimeZoneToSession()) {
       TimeZone connectionTz = context.getConnectionTimeZone();
       ZoneId connectionZoneId = connectionTz.toZoneId();