diff --git a/ingestion-sink/pom.xml b/ingestion-sink/pom.xml
index e86224ecad..a1de91b96e 100644
--- a/ingestion-sink/pom.xml
+++ b/ingestion-sink/pom.xml
@@ -20,6 +20,11 @@
     </properties>
 
     <dependencies>
+        <dependency>
+            <groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.datatype</groupId>
+            <artifactId>jackson-datatype-json-org</artifactId>
+            <version>${jackson.version}</version>
+        </dependency>
         <dependency>
             <groupId>com.google.cloud</groupId>
             <artifactId>google-cloud-pubsub</artifactId>
diff --git a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/BigQuery.java b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/BigQuery.java
index a21891584b..d62f578115 100644
--- a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/BigQuery.java
+++ b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/BigQuery.java
@@ -17,6 +17,7 @@
 import java.util.concurrent.ConcurrentMap;
 import java.util.concurrent.atomic.AtomicReference;
 import java.util.function.Function;
+import java.util.logging.Logger;
 
 public class BigQuery {
 
@@ -35,6 +36,8 @@ private WriteErrors(List<BigQueryError> errors) {
 
   public static class Write implements Function<Write.TableRow, CompletableFuture<Write.TableRow>> {
 
+    private static final Logger logger = Logger.getLogger("BigQuery.Write");
+
     private final com.google.cloud.bigquery.BigQuery bigquery;
     private final int maxBytes = 10_000_000; // HTTP request size limit: 10 MB
     private final int maxMessages = 10_000; // Maximum rows per request: 10,000
@@ -137,7 +140,8 @@ private synchronized Optional<CompletableFuture<TableRow>> add(TableRow row) {
         int index = newSize - 1;
         return Optional.of(result.thenApplyAsync(r -> {
           List<BigQueryError> errors = r.getErrorsFor(index);
-          if (!errors.isEmpty()) {
+          if (errors != null && !errors.isEmpty()) {
+            logger.warning(errors.toString());
             throw new WriteErrors(errors);
           }
           return row;
diff --git a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/Pubsub.java b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/Pubsub.java
index 4d2383602f..b574ef19cb 100644
--- a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/Pubsub.java
+++ b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/io/Pubsub.java
@@ -4,12 +4,15 @@
 
 package com.mozilla.telemetry.ingestion.io;
 
+import static java.util.logging.Level.WARNING;
+
 import com.google.cloud.pubsub.v1.Subscriber;
 import com.google.common.annotations.VisibleForTesting;
 import com.google.pubsub.v1.ProjectSubscriptionName;
 import com.google.pubsub.v1.PubsubMessage;
 import java.util.concurrent.CompletableFuture;
 import java.util.function.Function;
+import java.util.logging.Logger;
 
 public class Pubsub {
 
@@ -18,6 +21,8 @@ private Pubsub() {
 
   public static class Read {
 
+    static Logger logger = Logger.getLogger("Pubsub.Read");
+
     @VisibleForTesting
     Subscriber subscriber;
 
@@ -30,6 +35,7 @@ public Read(String subscriptionName, Function<PubsubMessage, CompletableFuture<?
                 if (exception == null) {
                   consumer.ack();
                 } else {
+                  logger.log(WARNING, "Exception while attempting to deliver message:", exception);
                   consumer.nack();
                 }
               })))
diff --git a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRow.java b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRow.java
index 9d658c77ab..0087dd9f8e 100644
--- a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRow.java
+++ b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRow.java
@@ -7,6 +7,8 @@
 import com.google.cloud.bigquery.TableId;
 import com.google.pubsub.v1.PubsubMessage;
 import com.mozilla.telemetry.ingestion.io.BigQuery.Write.TableRow;
+import com.mozilla.telemetry.ingestion.util.Json;
+import java.util.Base64;
 import java.util.HashMap;
 import java.util.Map;
 import java.util.Optional;
@@ -18,6 +20,8 @@ public enum TableRowFormat {
     raw, decoded, payload
   }
 
+  private static final Base64.Encoder base64Encoder = Base64.getEncoder();
+
   private final String tableSpecTemplate;
   private final TableRowFormat tableRowFormat;
 
@@ -47,15 +51,18 @@ public TableRow apply(PubsubMessage message) {
     final TableId tableId = getTableId(message.getAttributesMap());
     final Optional<String> documentId = Optional
         .ofNullable(message.getAttributesOrDefault("document_id", null));
+    final Map<String, Object> contents;
     switch (tableRowFormat) {
       case raw:
-        return new TableRow(tableId, message.getSerializedSize(), documentId, rawContents(message));
+        contents = rawContents(message);
+        break;
       case decoded:
       case payload:
       default:
         throw new IllegalArgumentException(
             "TableRowFormat not yet implemented: " + tableRowFormat.name());
     }
+    return new TableRow(tableId, Json.asBytes(contents).length, documentId, contents);
   }
 
   /**
@@ -69,7 +76,8 @@ public TableRow apply(PubsubMessage message) {
    */
   private Map<String, Object> rawContents(PubsubMessage message) {
     Map<String, Object> contents = new HashMap<>(message.getAttributesMap());
-    contents.put("payload", message.getData().toByteArray());
+    // bytes must inserted as base64 encoded strings
+    contents.put("payload", base64Encoder.encodeToString(message.getData().toByteArray()));
     return contents;
   }
 }
diff --git a/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/util/Json.java b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/util/Json.java
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..56cae32850
--- /dev/null
+++ b/ingestion-sink/src/main/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/util/Json.java
@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
+/* This Source Code Form is subject to the terms of the Mozilla Public
+ * License, v. 2.0. If a copy of the MPL was not distributed with this
+ * file, You can obtain one at http://mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/. */
+
+package com.mozilla.telemetry.ingestion.util;
+
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.ObjectMapper;
+import java.io.IOException;
+import java.io.UncheckedIOException;
+
+public class Json {
+
+  /**
+   * A Jackson ObjectMapper pre-configured for use in com.mozilla.telemetry.
+   */
+  private static final ObjectMapper MAPPER = new ObjectMapper();
+
+  /**
+   * Serialize {@code data} as a {@code byte[]}.
+   *
+   * @exception UncheckedIOException if data cannot be encoded as json.
+   */
+  public static byte[] asBytes(Object data) {
+    try {
+      return MAPPER.writeValueAsBytes(data);
+    } catch (IOException e) {
+      throw new UncheckedIOException(e);
+    }
+  }
+}
diff --git a/ingestion-sink/src/test/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRowTest.java b/ingestion-sink/src/test/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRowTest.java
index 4578c588f3..a89c64adbe 100644
--- a/ingestion-sink/src/test/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRowTest.java
+++ b/ingestion-sink/src/test/java/com/mozilla/telemetry/ingestion/transform/PubsubMessageToTableRowTest.java
@@ -27,10 +27,9 @@ public void canTransformSingleMessage() {
 
     assertEquals("telemetry_raw", actual.tableId.getDataset());
     assertEquals("main_v4", actual.tableId.getTable());
-    assertEquals(104, actual.byteSize);
-    assertEquals("test", new String((byte[]) actual.content.remove("payload")));
+    assertEquals(120, actual.byteSize);
     assertEquals(ImmutableMap.of("document_id", "id", "document_namespace", "telemetry",
-        "document_type", "main", "document_version", "4"), actual.content);
+        "document_type", "main", "document_version", "4", "payload", "dGVzdA=="), actual.content);
   }
 
   @Test
@@ -41,11 +40,9 @@ public void canHandleEmptyValues() {
 
     assertEquals("_raw", actual.tableId.getDataset());
     assertEquals("_v", actual.tableId.getTable());
-    assertEquals(65, actual.byteSize);
-    assertEquals("", new String((byte[]) actual.content.remove("payload")));
-    assertEquals(
-        ImmutableMap.of("document_namespace", "", "document_type", "", "document_version", ""),
-        actual.content);
+    assertEquals(79, actual.byteSize);
+    assertEquals(ImmutableMap.of("document_namespace", "", "document_type", "", "document_version",
+        "", "payload", ""), actual.content);
   }
 
   @Test(expected = IllegalArgumentException.class)
diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 70783cc67d..38e86394d8 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@
 
         <!-- Keep these dependency versions in sync with those pulled in by beam;
              check https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.apache.beam -->
-        <google-cloud.version>1.49.0</google-cloud.version>
+        <google-cloud.version>1.61.0</google-cloud.version>
         <jackson.version>2.9.9</jackson.version>
     </properties>