The head of the German Train Drivers’ Union (GDL), Mario Reiß, has accused Deutsche Bahn (DB) of manipulating train punctuality statistics. “That trains are being removed from the statistics to embellish the results is no surprise to us and has long been an open secret among professionals,” he told the Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland on Friday. “Our members have been experiencing such situations in their daily work for a long time and report them to us regularly.”
The weekly magazine Der Spiegel had previously reported that the railway operator cancels trains in order to improve its punctuality statistics. DB rejected the accusation. “The DB does not manipulate statistics,” the company declared.
GDL chief Reiß told the RND newspapers that the company’s leadership was attempting “to distract from the real causes with number tricks and empty runs.” He added: “Every single delay triggers further subsequent delays, a veritable whirlpool develops. Instead of addressing this core problem, short-term measures are used to create the impression that the situation is under control. For passengers, this of course means missed connections, long waiting times, and growing mistrust.”
According to Der Spiegel, citing internal memos and chat messages, there were two cases in which trains had been taken out of service “to improve the statistics.” The railway explained that the internal platform “BetriebLive” quoted by Der Spiegel was used for day-to-day communication among thousands of dispatchers across all railway companies. The company stressed that the platform was a chat tool and not used for collecting statistics. “The wording chosen by one employee in this case is incorrect. He has already been contacted,” DB said.
The company emphasized that train cancellations are also taken into account when calculating passenger punctuality. Only around two percent of long-distance trains, it said, were affected by delays of more than 60 minutes. “In individual cases, it can make operational sense to end a train service early in order to enable our passengers to quickly transfer to the next scheduled long-distance train,” the statement read.
DB also pointed out that it had improved passenger punctuality in August. According to the company, 66.7 percent of passengers on long-distance trains reached their destination on time, meaning with less than 15 minutes’ delay. In August, the figure had stood at 64.0 percent, and in July 2025 at 59.4 percent. The company attributed the poor performance mainly to a fragile infrastructure and the large number of additional construction projects required.
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