diff --git a/federationapi/routing/send.go b/federationapi/routing/send.go
index b7341dd32..25822f8be 100644
--- a/federationapi/routing/send.go
+++ b/federationapi/routing/send.go
@@ -210,6 +210,8 @@ func (t *txnReq) processTransaction(ctx context.Context) (*gomatrixserverlib.Res
 	//var resultsMutex sync.Mutex
 
 	var wg sync.WaitGroup
+	wg.Add(1) // for processEDUs
+
 	for _, pdu := range t.PDUs {
 		pduCountTotal.WithLabelValues("total").Inc()
 		var header struct {
@@ -276,8 +278,6 @@ func (t *txnReq) processTransaction(ctx context.Context) (*gomatrixserverlib.Res
 		})
 	}
 
-	wg.Wait()
-
 	go func() {
 		defer wg.Done()
 		t.processEDUs(ctx)