diff --git a/deluser.sh b/deluser.sh
index 1687dcd..5773af4 100755
--- a/deluser.sh
+++ b/deluser.sh
@@ -1,7 +1,11 @@
 #!/bin/sh
 SLBRUSER=$1
 test -z "$SLBRUSER" && echo "no user provided" && exit
-grep -qvx "$SLBRUSER" users.txt && echo "user not found in users.txt, will not delete" && exit
+if !(grep -qx "$SLBRUSER" users.txt)
+then
+	echo "user not found in users.txt, will not delete"
+	exit
+fi
 
 if ps -o stat= -p $PPID | grep -qv S+ #check if this is being called from listen.py
 then
@@ -13,5 +17,4 @@ lxc stop "$SLBRUSER"
 lxc delete "$SLBRUSER"
 sudo rm -rf "$SLBRUSER"
 sudo userdel "$SLBRUSER"
-tr '\n' ' ' < users.txt | sed "s/$SLBRUSER//g" | tr ' ' '\n' > users.temp
-mv users.temp users
+sed -ie "s/$SLBRUSER .*$//g"