diff --git a/src/lib/Hydra/Helper/AddBuilds.pm b/src/lib/Hydra/Helper/AddBuilds.pm
index 32dea879..220f2bd6 100644
--- a/src/lib/Hydra/Helper/AddBuilds.pm
+++ b/src/lib/Hydra/Helper/AddBuilds.pm
@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@ package Hydra::Helper::AddBuilds;
 
 use strict;
 use feature 'switch';
+use utf8;
 use XML::Simple;
 use IPC::Run;
 use Nix::Store;
@@ -291,6 +292,9 @@ sub evalJobs {
         }
     }
 
+    # Handle utf-8 characters in error messages. No idea why this works.
+    utf8::decode($_->{msg}) foreach @{$jobs->{error}};
+
     return ($jobs, $nixExprInput, $errors);
 }
 
diff --git a/src/script/hydra-evaluator b/src/script/hydra-evaluator
index 52192c74..3a089e58 100755
--- a/src/script/hydra-evaluator
+++ b/src/script/hydra-evaluator
@@ -2,6 +2,7 @@
 
 use strict;
 use feature 'switch';
+use utf8;
 use Hydra::Schema;
 use Hydra::Plugin;
 use Hydra::Helper::Nix;
@@ -250,7 +251,9 @@ sub checkJobsetWrapped {
                 default { $bindings .= "..."; }
             }
         }
-        $msg .= "at `" . $error->{location} . "' [$bindings]:\n" . $error->{msg} . "\n\n";
+        $msg .=
+            ($error->{location} ne "" ? "in job ‘$error->{location}’" : "at top-level") .
+            " [$bindings]:\n" . $error->{msg} . "\n\n";
     }
     setJobsetError($jobset, $msg);
 }