diff --git a/src/maketools/plumedcheck b/src/maketools/plumedcheck
index 2c47b8ef50b6c1af1ead5bf1ed1105170dc6adb6..1500e85d3a6def15ee02e9dcef307242558da936 100755
--- a/src/maketools/plumedcheck
+++ b/src/maketools/plumedcheck
@@ -149,6 +149,7 @@ BEGIN{
 
 # create tmp dir for future usage
   "mktemp -dt plumed.XXXXXX" | getline tmpdir
+  close("mktemp -dt plumed.XXXXXX")
 
 # checking astyle presence
   astyle_available=!system(astyle " --version > /dev/null 2> /dev/null")