diff --git a/doc/6-object-types.md b/doc/6-object-types.md
index 9e3e7e9af..3b87ff8a1 100644
--- a/doc/6-object-types.md
+++ b/doc/6-object-types.md
@@ -900,6 +900,11 @@ perfdata label. Fields (value, warn, crit, min, max) are created from data if av
 and the configuration allows it.  If a value associated with a tag is not able to be
 resolved, it will be dropped and not sent to the target host.
 
+Backslashes are allowed in tag keys, tag values and field keys, however they are also
+escape characters when followed by a space or comma, but cannot be escaped themselves.
+As a result all trailling slashes in these fields are replaced with an underscore.  This
+predominantly affects Windows paths e.g. `C:\` becomes `C:_`.
+
 The database is assumed to exist so this object will make no attempt to create it currently.
 
 Configuration Attributes:
diff --git a/lib/perfdata/influxdbwriter.cpp b/lib/perfdata/influxdbwriter.cpp
index 92091aafb..6eb8d0091 100644
--- a/lib/perfdata/influxdbwriter.cpp
+++ b/lib/perfdata/influxdbwriter.cpp
@@ -237,6 +237,16 @@ String InfluxdbWriter::EscapeKey(const String& str)
 	String result = str;
 	boost::algorithm::replace_all(result, ",", "\\,");
 	boost::algorithm::replace_all(result, " ", "\\ ");
+
+	// InfluxDB 'feature': although backslashes are allowed in keys they also act
+	// as escape sequences when followed by ',' or ' '.  When your tag is like
+	// 'metric=C:\' bad things happen.  Backslashes themselves cannot be escaped
+	// and through experimentation they also escape '='.  To be safe we replace
+	// trailing backslashes with and underscore.
+	size_t length = result.GetLength();
+	if (result[length - 1] == '\\')
+		result[length - 1] = '_';
+
 	return result;
 }
 
@@ -284,7 +294,7 @@ void InfluxdbWriter::SendMetric(const Dictionary::Ptr& tmpl, const String& label
 		}
 	}
 
-	msgbuf << ",metric=" << label << " ";
+	msgbuf << ",metric=" << EscapeKey(label) << " ";
 
 	bool first = true;
 	ObjectLock fieldLock(fields);