diff --git a/app/notifications/notifications_letter_callback.py b/app/notifications/notifications_letter_callback.py
index 2f758b7ac..1de6c0009 100644
--- a/app/notifications/notifications_letter_callback.py
+++ b/app/notifications/notifications_letter_callback.py
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ def validate_schema(schema):
     def decorator(f):
         @wraps(f)
         def wrapper(*args, **kw):
-            validate(request.json, schema)
+            validate(request.get_json(force=True), schema)
             return f(*args, **kw)
         return wrapper
     return decorator
@@ -44,7 +44,8 @@ def validate_schema(schema):
 @letter_callback_blueprint.route('/notifications/letter/dvla', methods=['POST'])
 @validate_schema(dvla_sns_callback_schema)
 def process_letter_response():
-    req_json = request.json
+    req_json = request.get_json(force=True)
+    current_app.logger.info('Received SNS callback: {}'.format(req_json))
     if not autoconfirm_subscription(req_json):
         # The callback should have one record for an S3 Put Event.
         filename = req_json['Message']['Records'][0]['s3']['object']['key']
diff --git a/tests/app/notifications/rest/test_callbacks.py b/tests/app/notifications/rest/test_callbacks.py
index a15a607df..5c8f96baa 100644
--- a/tests/app/notifications/rest/test_callbacks.py
+++ b/tests/app/notifications/rest/test_callbacks.py
@@ -71,6 +71,18 @@ def test_dvla_callback_calls_update_letter_notifications_task(client, mocker):
     update_task.assert_called_with(['bar.txt'], queue='notify')
 
 
+def test_dvla_callback_does_not_raise_error_parsing_json_for_plaintext_header(client, mocker):
+    mocker.patch('app.notifications.notifications_letter_callback.update_letter_notifications_statuses.apply_async')
+    data = _sample_sns_s3_callback()
+    response = client.post(
+        path='/notifications/letter/dvla',
+        data=data,
+        headers=[('Content-Type', 'text/plain')]
+    )
+
+    assert response.status_code == 200
+
+
 def test_firetext_callback_should_not_need_auth(client, mocker):
     mocker.patch('app.statsd_client.incr')
     response = client.post(