diff --git a/utils/src/com/cloud/utils/UriUtils.java b/utils/src/com/cloud/utils/UriUtils.java
index 2e771aea9ca..42456b52147 100644
--- a/utils/src/com/cloud/utils/UriUtils.java
+++ b/utils/src/com/cloud/utils/UriUtils.java
@@ -94,15 +94,12 @@ public class UriUtils {
 
         if (pathStart > 0) {
             String[] tokens = url.substring(pathStart + 1).split("/");
-            if (tokens != null) {
-                StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
-                sb.append(url.substring(0, pathStart));
-                for (String token : tokens) {
-                    sb.append("/").append(URLEncoder.encode(token));
-                }
-
-                return sb.toString();
+            StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder(url.substring(0, pathStart));
+            for (String token : tokens) {
+                sb.append("/").append(URLEncoder.encode(token));
             }
+
+            return sb.toString();
         }
 
         // no need to do URL component encoding
diff --git a/utils/test/com/cloud/utils/UriUtilsTest.java b/utils/test/com/cloud/utils/UriUtilsTest.java
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..8474bd0a6ed
--- /dev/null
+++ b/utils/test/com/cloud/utils/UriUtilsTest.java
@@ -0,0 +1,33 @@
+// Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
+// or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
+// distributed with this work for additional information
+// regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
+// to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
+// "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
+// the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+// http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing,
+// software distributed under the License is distributed on an
+// "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY
+// KIND, either express or implied.  See the License for the
+// specific language governing permissions and limitations
+// under the License.
+package com.cloud.utils;
+
+import junit.framework.Assert;
+
+import org.junit.Test;
+
+public class UriUtilsTest {
+    @Test
+    public void encodeURIComponent() {
+        Assert.assertEquals("http://localhost",
+                UriUtils.encodeURIComponent("http://localhost"));
+        Assert.assertEquals("http://localhost/",
+                UriUtils.encodeURIComponent("http://localhost/"));
+        Assert.assertEquals("http://localhost/foo/bar",
+                UriUtils.encodeURIComponent("http://localhost/foo/bar"));
+    }
+}