diff --git a/lib/postgresql.js b/lib/postgresql.js
index 13d78f0a..a947a0ee 100644
--- a/lib/postgresql.js
+++ b/lib/postgresql.js
@@ -72,13 +72,10 @@ function PostgreSQL(postgresql, settings) {
   // this._models = {};
   // this.settings = settings;
   this.constructor.super_.call(this, 'postgresql', settings);
+  this.clientConfig = settings;
   if (settings.url) {
     // pg-pool doesn't handle string config correctly
-    this.clientConfig = {
-      connectionString: settings.url,
-    };
-  } else {
-    this.clientConfig = settings;
+    this.clientConfig.connectionString = settings.url;
   }
   this.clientConfig.Promise = Promise;
   this.pg = new postgresql.Pool(this.clientConfig);
diff --git a/test/postgresql.initialization.test.js b/test/postgresql.initialization.test.js
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..d16a750d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test/postgresql.initialization.test.js
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+// Copyright IBM Corp. 2015. All Rights Reserved.
+// Node module: loopback-connector-postgresql
+// This file is licensed under the Artistic License 2.0.
+// License text available at https://opensource.org/licenses/Artistic-2.0
+
+'use strict';
+require('./init');
+
+var connector = require('..');
+var DataSource = require('loopback-datasource-juggler').DataSource;
+var should = require('should');
+
+// simple wrapper that uses JSON.parse(JSON.stringify()) as cheap clone
+function newConfig(withURL) {
+  return JSON.parse(JSON.stringify(getDBConfig(withURL)));
+}
+
+describe('initialization', function() {
+  it('honours user-defined pg-pool settings', function() {
+    var dataSource = new DataSource(connector, newConfig());
+    var pool = dataSource.connector.pg.pool;
+    pool._factory.max.should.not.equal(999);
+
+    var settings = newConfig();
+    settings.max = 999; // non-default value
+    var dataSource = new DataSource(connector, settings);
+    var pool = dataSource.connector.pg.pool;
+    pool._factory.max.should.equal(999);
+  });
+
+  it('honours user-defined url settings', function() {
+    var settings = newConfig();
+
+    var dataSource = new DataSource(connector, settings);
+    var clientConfig = dataSource.connector.clientConfig;
+    should.not.exist(clientConfig.connectionString);
+
+    settings = newConfig(true);
+    var dataSource = new DataSource(connector, settings);
+    var clientConfig = dataSource.connector.clientConfig;
+    clientConfig.connectionString.should.equal(settings.url);
+  });
+
+  it('honours multiple user-defined settings', function() {
+    var urlOnly = {url: newConfig(true).url, max: 999};
+
+    var dataSource = new DataSource(connector, urlOnly);
+    var pool = dataSource.connector.pg.pool;
+    pool._factory.max.should.equal(999);
+
+    var clientConfig = dataSource.connector.clientConfig;
+    clientConfig.connectionString.should.equal(urlOnly.url);
+  });
+});