diff --git a/datadictionary/datadictionary.go b/datadictionary/datadictionary.go
index 9342b3dd5..b032d078e 100644
--- a/datadictionary/datadictionary.go
+++ b/datadictionary/datadictionary.go
@@ -315,6 +315,10 @@ func Parse(path string) (*DataDictionary, error) {
 func ParseSrc(xmlSrc io.Reader) (*DataDictionary, error) {
 	doc := new(XMLDoc)
 	decoder := xml.NewDecoder(xmlSrc)
+	decoder.CharsetReader = func(encoding string, input io.Reader) (io.Reader, error) {
+		return input, nil
+	}
+
 	if err := decoder.Decode(doc); err != nil {
 		return nil, errors.Wrapf(err, "problem parsing XML file")
 	}
diff --git a/validation.go b/validation.go
index 58fbea80e..72bb06628 100644
--- a/validation.go
+++ b/validation.go
@@ -246,6 +246,7 @@ func validateVisitGroupField(fieldDef *datadictionary.FieldDef, fieldStack []Tag
 			if childDefs[0].Required() {
 				return fieldStack, RequiredTagMissing(Tag(childDefs[0].Tag()))
 			}
+			fieldStack = fieldStack[1:]
 		}
 
 		childDefs = childDefs[1:]