diff --git a/lib/core/agent.py b/lib/core/agent.py
index 68fc22817..6327aeeb8 100644
--- a/lib/core/agent.py
+++ b/lib/core/agent.py
@@ -1053,7 +1053,7 @@ class Agent(object):
         """
 
         _ = re.escape(PAYLOAD_DELIMITER)
-        return re.sub("(?s)(%s.*?%s)" % (_, _), ("%s%s%s" % (PAYLOAD_DELIMITER, payload, PAYLOAD_DELIMITER)).replace("\\", r"\\"), value) if value else value
+        return re.sub("(?s)(%s.*?%s)" % (_, _), ("%s%s%s" % (PAYLOAD_DELIMITER, getUnicode(payload), PAYLOAD_DELIMITER)).replace("\\", r"\\"), value) if value else value
 
     def runAsDBMSUser(self, query):
         if conf.dbmsCred and "Ad Hoc Distributed Queries" not in query: