Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, and Cologne are epicenters of driver fraud at gas stations. According to Russkaya Germaniya, in these major cities, drivers regularly fill up their vehicles with fuel and drive off without paying. Throughout 2015, more than 80,000 such cases were recorded across Germany, with a disproportionately high number in the four aforementioned metropolises. In the German capital alone last year, drivers filled up without paying at least 5,830 times.
Gas theft is a daily occurrence in Germany, as indicated by the federal police crime statistics (Polizeiliche Kriminalstatistik, PKS). In the Federal Republic in 2015, there were about 14,500 gas stations, and more than 80,000 times their owners and employees were defrauded by non-payers. Statistically, this means that 1.5% of gas stations fell victim to fraud, which occurs 220 times a day in Germany. Compared to the previous year, 2014, the number of such cases decreased by 7.8 percent. Experts attribute this not to increased driver conscientiousness, but to lower fuel prices.
Since 2010, fraud at gas stations has been recorded in crime statistics as a separate offense. 'The real figure is about three times higher than official police data,' states Karl-Heinz Zaisek, a board member of the Federal Association of Gas Stations and Commercial Car Washes (Bundesverband Tankstellen und Gewerbliche Autowäsche, BTG), citing the low clearance rate for such offenses.
Drivers ready to fill up and drive off without paying are not deterred even by the abundance of surveillance cameras installed at most German gas stations. 'Thieves are becoming bolder,' laments Zaisek. 'More and more often, they use stolen license plates. Since many know how low the risk of being caught is, they smile friendly right into the surveillance camera lens.'
Crime statistics, which only account for fraudsters caught by police methods, show that only 22.2% of gas thefts are solved. Moreover, prosecutors often drop cases due to the small amount of damage caused, even though the total damage amounts to 30 million euros per year. This damage must be covered by all conscientious motorists: the potential losses of oil companies and gas station owners are inevitably factored into fuel prices.