diff --git a/samples/vsphere/vcenter/certificatemanagement/replace_tls_certificate.py b/samples/vsphere/vcenter/certificatemanagement/replace_tls_certificate.py
index 881f4bd24..70a4ee086 100644
--- a/samples/vsphere/vcenter/certificatemanagement/replace_tls_certificate.py
+++ b/samples/vsphere/vcenter/certificatemanagement/replace_tls_certificate.py
@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@
 cert = args.cert.encode(encoding='utf-8').decode('unicode_escape')
 
 if args.key is not None:
-    key = args.encode(encoding='utf-8').key.decode('unicode_escape')
+    key = args.key.encode(encoding='utf-8').decode('unicode_escape')
 else:
     key = args.key