diff --git a/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/bot/bot.update.ts b/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/bot/bot.update.ts
index 31a906872..8cb5b47b8 100644
--- a/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/bot/bot.update.ts
+++ b/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/bot/bot.update.ts
@@ -67,13 +67,21 @@ export class BotUpdate {
 		this.logger.log(`/users command from ${ctx.from?.id}`);
 		await ctx.reply('👥 Lade User-Statistiken...');
 
-		const stats = await this.usersService.getUserStats();
-		if (!stats) {
-			await ctx.reply('❌ Datenbank nicht verfügbar');
-			return;
-		}
+		try {
+			const stats = await this.usersService.getUserStats();
+			if (!stats) {
+				this.logger.warn('User stats returned null - database may not be configured');
+				await ctx.reply('❌ Datenbank nicht verfügbar. Prüfe DATABASE_URL Konfiguration.');
+				return;
+			}
 
-		const report = formatUsersReport(stats);
-		await ctx.replyWithHTML(report);
+			const report = formatUsersReport(stats);
+			await ctx.replyWithHTML(report);
+		} catch (error) {
+			this.logger.error('Failed to get user stats:', error);
+			await ctx.reply(
+				`❌ Fehler beim Laden der User-Statistiken: ${error instanceof Error ? error.message : 'Unbekannter Fehler'}`
+			);
+		}
 	}
 }
diff --git a/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/users/users.service.ts b/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/users/users.service.ts
index 58b903ba8..c87479c51 100644
--- a/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/users/users.service.ts
+++ b/services/telegram-stats-bot/src/users/users.service.ts
@@ -31,10 +31,16 @@ export class UsersService implements OnModuleInit {
 	async onModuleInit() {
 		if (this.databaseUrl) {
 			try {
+				// Mask password in logs
+				const maskedUrl = this.databaseUrl.replace(/:([^@]+)@/, ':****@');
+				this.logger.log(`Connecting to database: ${maskedUrl}`);
 				this.sql = postgres(this.databaseUrl);
-				this.logger.log('Database connection initialized');
+				// Test connection
+				await this.sql`SELECT 1`;
+				this.logger.log('Database connection initialized and tested successfully');
 			} catch (error) {
-				this.logger.warn('Failed to initialize database connection:', error);
+				this.logger.error('Failed to initialize database connection:', error);
+				this.sql = null;
 			}
 		} else {
 			this.logger.warn('DATABASE_URL not configured, user stats will be unavailable');