diff --git a/source/JSONWebToken-Core.package/JWSCompactSerializer.class/instance/writePayload..st b/source/JSONWebToken-Core.package/JWSCompactSerializer.class/instance/writePayload..st
index 98cd8f0..26c925b 100644
--- a/source/JSONWebToken-Core.package/JWSCompactSerializer.class/instance/writePayload..st
+++ b/source/JSONWebToken-Core.package/JWSCompactSerializer.class/instance/writePayload..st
@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
 writing
 writePayload: anObject
-	stream nextPutAll: (self class base64UrlEncoded: anObject asJson asByteArray) 
\ No newline at end of file
+	stream nextPutAll: (self class base64UrlEncoded: anObject asJson utf8Encoded) 
\ No newline at end of file