diff --git a/uk/ac/sanger/artemis/io/GFFStreamFeature.java b/uk/ac/sanger/artemis/io/GFFStreamFeature.java
index 3bb349fd1dc370ee5079464222a9c0db31167340..1909bed71e6696b5166214241cbf2f40b4d436e9 100644
--- a/uk/ac/sanger/artemis/io/GFFStreamFeature.java
+++ b/uk/ac/sanger/artemis/io/GFFStreamFeature.java
@@ -1374,7 +1374,8 @@ public class GFFStreamFeature extends SimpleDocumentFeature
     if(feature.getQualifiers().getQualifierByName("gene_id") != null && 
        feature.getQualifiers().getQualifierByName("transcript_id") != null)
     {
-      logger4j.debug(feature.getEntry().getName()+" is in GTF format");
+      if(feature.getEntry() != null)
+        logger4j.debug(feature.getEntry().getName()+" is in GTF format");
       return true;
     }
     return false;