diff --git a/ibm_vpd/wait-vpd-parsers.sh b/ibm_vpd/wait-vpd-parsers.sh
index 90f8b30..4f479da 100644
--- a/ibm_vpd/wait-vpd-parsers.sh
+++ b/ibm_vpd/wait-vpd-parsers.sh
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 #!/bin/sh
 retries=100
 echo "Checking every 2s for active VPD parsers..."
-while [ $retries -ne 0 ]
+while [ "$retries" -ne 0 ]
 do
     sleep 2
     systemctl -q is-active ibm-vpd-parser@*.service
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@
         echo "Done wait for active VPD parsers. Exit success"
         exit 0
     fi
-    retries=$((retries - 1))
+    retries="$((retries - 1))"
     echo "VPD parsers still running. Retries remaining: $retries"
 done
 echo "Exit wait for VPD services to finish with timeout"