A quick question on a leisure battery

Fieldfare

Hello all,

I disconnected my leisure battery for storage (lesson learned the hard way recently) and when reconnecting I had two plastic (marked with a + and a - respectively) caps ... almost like a top-hat shape.

I'm not sure - I can't recall - where these came from.

Mmmhh?

Head scrach time.

Are they there to protect the connectors when the battery is disconnected?

I don't see how they can be useful when it is connected.

Thanks.