diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 70f1267..8dc24c8 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -2,6 +2,22 @@
 
 * As of v1.4.0 release candidates will be published in an effort to get new features out faster while still allowing time for full QA testing before moving the release candidate to a full release.
 
+## v1.6.1rc5 [2023-12-15]
+#### What's New
+* None
+
+#### Enhancements
+* None
+
+#### Bug Fixes
+* Switch to extracting expiration time from the JWT instead of calculating based on auth time + session duration
+
+#### Dependencies
+* None
+
+#### Other
+* Additional debug logging related to the authentication process
+
 ## v1.6.1rc4 [2023-12-14]
 #### What's New
 * None
diff --git a/setup.cfg b/setup.cfg
index 8d54011..f44e4be 100644
--- a/setup.cfg
+++ b/setup.cfg
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 [metadata]
 name = pybritive
-version = 1.6.1rc4
+version = 1.6.1rc5
 author = Britive Inc.
 author_email = support@britive.com
 description = A pure Python CLI for Britive
diff --git a/src/pybritive/britive_cli.py b/src/pybritive/britive_cli.py
index 2e1403e..8200e7c 100644
--- a/src/pybritive/britive_cli.py
+++ b/src/pybritive/britive_cli.py
@@ -129,6 +129,7 @@ def login(self, explicit: bool = False, browser: str = None):
                 except exceptions.UnauthorizedRequest as e:
                     if '401 - e0000' in str(e).lower():
                         self.print(f'attempt {counter} of 3 - login failed')
+                        self.debug(f'login error message was {str(e)}')
                         self.logout()
                     else:
                         raise e
diff --git a/src/pybritive/helpers/credentials.py b/src/pybritive/helpers/credentials.py
index e40230b..b15264e 100644
--- a/src/pybritive/helpers/credentials.py
+++ b/src/pybritive/helpers/credentials.py
@@ -30,10 +30,6 @@
 ]
 
 
-# the credentials should expire sooner than the true expiration date
-# in case we need to do things like polling for credentials during
-# an approval process
-credential_expiration_safe_zone_minutes = 0
 federation_provider_default_expiration_seconds = 900
 
 
@@ -45,6 +41,10 @@ def b64_encode_url_safe(value: bytes):
     return base64.urlsafe_b64encode(value).decode('utf-8').replace('=', '')
 
 
+class CouldNotExtractExpirationTimeFromJwtException(Exception):
+    pass
+
+
 # this base class expects self.credentials to be a dict - so sub classes need to convert to dict
 class CredentialManager:
     def __init__(self, tenant_name: str, tenant_alias: str, cli: any, federation_provider: str = None,
@@ -119,11 +119,23 @@ def perform_interactive_login(self):
             else:
                 credentials = response.json()['authenticationResult']
 
-                # calculate a safe expiration time
-                auth_time = int(credentials.get('authTime', 0))
-                session_time = int(credentials.get('maxSessionTimeout', 0))
-                creds_expire_after = auth_time + session_time - (credential_expiration_safe_zone_minutes * 60 * 1000)
-                credentials['safeExpirationTime'] = creds_expire_after
+                try:
+                    # attempt to pull the expiration time from the jwt
+                    expiration_time_ms = self._extract_exp_from_jwt(
+                        token=credentials['accessToken'],
+                        verify=False,
+                        convert_to_ms=True
+                    )
+                    self.cli.debug(f'found expiration time {expiration_time_ms} from jwt')
+                except CouldNotExtractExpirationTimeFromJwtException:
+                    # calculate from other fields in the authentication result
+                    self.cli.debug('could not extract token expiration time from jwt - dropping to use other fields')
+                    auth_time = int(credentials.get('authTime', 0))
+                    session_time = int(credentials.get('maxSessionTimeout', 0))
+                    expiration_time_ms = auth_time + session_time
+                    self.cli.debug(f'found expiration time {expiration_time_ms} from authTime + maxSessionTimeout')
+
+                credentials['safeExpirationTime'] = expiration_time_ms
 
                 # drop a bunch of unnecessary fields
                 for field in interactive_login_fields_to_pop:
@@ -133,6 +145,24 @@ def perform_interactive_login(self):
                 self.cli.print(f'Authenticated to tenant {self.tenant} via interactive login.')
                 break
 
+    @staticmethod
+    def _extract_exp_from_jwt(token: str, verify: bool = False, convert_to_ms: bool = False):
+        try:
+            expiration_time = jwt.decode(
+                token,
+                # validation of the token will occur on the Britive backend
+                # so not verifying everything here is okay since we are just
+                # trying to extract the token expiration time so we can store
+                # it in the ~/.britive/pybritive.credentials[.encrypted] file
+                options={
+                    'verify_signature': verify,
+                    'verify_aud': verify
+                }
+            )['exp']
+            return expiration_time * (1000 if convert_to_ms else 1)
+        except Exception:
+            raise CouldNotExtractExpirationTimeFromJwtException
+
     def perform_federation_provider_authentication(self):
         self.cli.print(f'Performing {self.federation_provider} federation provider authentication '
                        f'against tenant {self.tenant}.')
@@ -168,17 +198,11 @@ def perform_federation_provider_authentication(self):
                 token_expires = json.loads(token)['iam_request_headers']['x-britive-expires']
                 expiration_time = int(parser.parse(token_expires).timestamp() * 1000)
             if provider == 'oidc':
-                expiration_time = jwt.decode(
-                    token,
-                    # validation of the token will occur on the Britive backend
-                    # so not verifying everything here is okay since we are just
-                    # trying to extract the token expiration time so we can store
-                    # it in the ~/.britive/pybritive.credentials[.encrypted] file
-                    options={
-                        'verify_signature': False,
-                        'verify_aud': False
-                    }
-                )['exp'] * 1000
+                expiration_time = self._extract_exp_from_jwt(
+                    token=token,
+                    verify=False,
+                    convert_to_ms=True
+                )
         except Exception:
             self.cli.print(f'Cannot obtain token expiration time for {self.federation_provider}. Defaulting to '
                            f'{federation_provider_default_expiration_seconds} seconds.')