diff --git a/tangostationcontrol/rpc/messagehandler.py b/tangostationcontrol/rpc/messagehandler.py
index 475c39557832c17c7690fbe500854fa335ce8db5..06cce144692dc9ed4b60675c502787c4e40186ae 100644
--- a/tangostationcontrol/rpc/messagehandler.py
+++ b/tangostationcontrol/rpc/messagehandler.py
@@ -138,7 +138,7 @@ class MultiEndpointZMQMessageHandler:
 
                     # decode payload
                     try:
-                        message = json.loads(payload.decode())
+                        message = json.loads(payload)
                     except (json.decoder.JSONDecodeError, UnicodeDecodeError):
                         logger.exception(
                             f"Could not decode message payload as JSON {uri=} {topic=} {payload=}"