diff --git a/hack/scripts/create_changelog.sh b/hack/scripts/create_changelog.sh
index 7955691e..25f9792f 100755
--- a/hack/scripts/create_changelog.sh
+++ b/hack/scripts/create_changelog.sh
@@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
 #!/usr/bin/env bash
 
-# Error handling.
+PREVIOUS_RELEASE=$2 # for testability
+
+# standard bash error handling
 set -o nounset  # treat unset variables as an error and exit immediately.
 set -o errexit  # exit immediately when a command fails.
 set -E          # needs to be set if we want the ERR trap
@@ -10,34 +12,28 @@ RELEASE_TAG=$1
 
 REPOSITORY=${REPOSITORY:-kyma-project/eventing-manager}
 GITHUB_URL=https://api.github.com/repos/${REPOSITORY}
-GITHUB_AUTH_HEADER="Authorization: token ${GH_TOKEN}"
+GITHUB_AUTH_HEADER="Authorization: token ${GITHUB_TOKEN}"
 CHANGELOG_FILE="CHANGELOG.md"
 
-# The git describe --tag --abbrev=0 command is used to find the most recent tag that is reachable from a commit.
-# The --tag option tells git describe to consider any tag found in the refs/tags namespace, enabling matching a lightweight (non-annotated) tag.
-PREVIOUS_RELEASE=$(git describe --tags --abbrev=0)
+if [ "${PREVIOUS_RELEASE}" == "" ]; then
+	PREVIOUS_RELEASE=$(git describe --tags --abbrev=0)
+fi
 
-# Generate the changelog in the CHANGELOG.md.
 echo "## What has changed" >>${CHANGELOG_FILE}
 
-# Iterate over all commits since the previous release.
-git log "${PREVIOUS_RELEASE}"..HEAD --pretty=tformat:"%h" --reverse | while read -r commit; do
-	# If the author of the commit is not kyma-bot, append the commit message to the changelog.
+git log ${PREVIOUS_RELEASE}..HEAD --pretty=tformat:"%h" --reverse | while read -r commit; do
 	COMMIT_AUTHOR=$(curl -H "${GITHUB_AUTH_HEADER}" -sS "${GITHUB_URL}/commits/${commit}" | jq -r '.author.login')
 	if [ "${COMMIT_AUTHOR}" != "kyma-bot" ]; then
-		git show -s "${commit}" --format="* %s by @${COMMIT_AUTHOR}" >>${CHANGELOG_FILE}
+		git show -s ${commit} --format="* %s by @${COMMIT_AUTHOR}" >>${CHANGELOG_FILE}
 	fi
 done
 
-# Create a new contibutors file (with a unique name based on the process ID of the current shell).
-NEW_CONTRIB=$$.authors
+NEW_CONTRIB=$$.new
 
-# Find unique authors who contributed since the last release, but not before it, and add them to the NEW_CONTRIB file.
 join -v2 \
 	<(curl -H "${GITHUB_AUTH_HEADER}" -sS "${GITHUB_URL}/compare/$(git rev-list --max-parents=0 HEAD)...${PREVIOUS_RELEASE}" | jq -r '.commits[].author.login' | sort -u) \
 	<(curl -H "${GITHUB_AUTH_HEADER}" -sS "${GITHUB_URL}/compare/${PREVIOUS_RELEASE}...HEAD" | jq -r '.commits[].author.login' | sort -u) >${NEW_CONTRIB}
 
-# Add new contributors to the 'new contributors' section of the changelog.
 if [ -s ${NEW_CONTRIB} ]; then
 	echo -e "\n## New contributors" >>${CHANGELOG_FILE}
 	while read -r user; do
@@ -49,5 +45,7 @@ if [ -s ${NEW_CONTRIB} ]; then
 	done <${NEW_CONTRIB}
 fi
 
-# Append link to the full-changelog this changelog.
 echo -e "\n**Full changelog**: https://github.com/$REPOSITORY/compare/${PREVIOUS_RELEASE}...${RELEASE_TAG}" >>${CHANGELOG_FILE}
+
+# cleanup
+rm ${NEW_CONTRIB} || echo "cleaned up"