diff --git a/app/celery/research_mode_tasks.py b/app/celery/research_mode_tasks.py
index b03d8ee69..8cfc243c8 100644
--- a/app/celery/research_mode_tasks.py
+++ b/app/celery/research_mode_tasks.py
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ from datetime import datetime, timedelta
 import json
 
 from flask import current_app
-from requests import request, RequestException, HTTPError
+from requests import request, HTTPError
 
 from notifications_utils.s3 import s3upload
 
@@ -66,16 +66,14 @@ def make_request(notification_type, provider, data, headers):
             timeout=60
         )
         response.raise_for_status()
-    except RequestException as e:
-        api_error = HTTPError(e)
+    except HTTPError as e:
         current_app.logger.error(
-            "API {} request on {} failed with {}".format(
-                "POST",
+            "API POST request on {} failed with status {}".format(
                 api_call,
-                api_error.response
+                e.response.status_code
             )
         )
-        raise api_error
+        raise e
     finally:
         current_app.logger.info("Mocked provider callback request finished")
     return response.json()
diff --git a/tests/app/celery/test_research_mode_tasks.py b/tests/app/celery/test_research_mode_tasks.py
index 7a00f7163..db03b4383 100644
--- a/tests/app/celery/test_research_mode_tasks.py
+++ b/tests/app/celery/test_research_mode_tasks.py
@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@ from app.celery.research_mode_tasks import (
     firetext_callback,
     ses_notification_callback,
     create_fake_letter_response_file,
+    HTTPError
 )
 from tests.conftest import set_config_values, Matcher
 
@@ -38,6 +39,25 @@ def test_make_mmg_callback(notify_api, rmock):
     assert json.loads(rmock.request_history[0].text)['MSISDN'] == '07700900001'
 
 
+def test_callback_logs_on_api_call_failure(notify_api, rmock, mocker):
+    endpoint = "http://localhost:6011/notifications/sms/mmg"
+    rmock.request(
+        "POST",
+        endpoint,
+        json={"error": "something went wrong"},
+        status_code=500)
+    mock_logger = mocker.patch('app.celery.tasks.current_app.logger.error')
+
+    with pytest.raises(HTTPError):
+        send_sms_response("mmg", "1234", "07700900001")
+
+    assert rmock.called
+    assert rmock.request_history[0].url == endpoint
+    mock_logger.assert_called_once_with(
+        'API POST request on http://localhost:6011/notifications/sms/mmg failed with status 500'
+    )
+
+
 @pytest.mark.parametrize("phone_number",
                          ["07700900001", "07700900002", "07700900003",
                           "07700900236"])