diff --git a/packages/wf-brainscales2-demos/package.py b/packages/wf-brainscales2-demos/package.py
index ff6cef584f7515c554bd4aa1ad282f32962527c0..f54ebef167c8e2ee55c19ad27a214e726b93b78a 100644
--- a/packages/wf-brainscales2-demos/package.py
+++ b/packages/wf-brainscales2-demos/package.py
@@ -58,7 +58,7 @@ class WfBrainscales2Demos(Package):
         except Exception as e:
             # if the notebook execution fails, re-run notebook to produce output with error
             # in case of a cell timeout, don't re-run
-            if "CellTimeoutError" not in e:
+            if "CellTimeoutError" not in str(e):
                 jupyter(*(args+["--allow-errors"]))
             raise
 
diff --git a/packages/wf-multi-area-model/package.py b/packages/wf-multi-area-model/package.py
index b8ff5feb8f4326cc8e756885b10e540904bf1632..76db0cf2097ab9dab37df5f290378ba74535d8d3 100644
--- a/packages/wf-multi-area-model/package.py
+++ b/packages/wf-multi-area-model/package.py
@@ -47,7 +47,7 @@ class WfMultiAreaModel(Package):
         try:
             # execute notebook and save
             jupyter(*args)
-        except ProcessError as e:
+        except Exception as e:
             # if the above fails, re-run notebook to produce output with error
             jupyter(*(args+["--allow-errors"]))
             raise