Circuit arrangement comprising a monitoring device

A circuit arrangement and a method are provided to avoid an uncontrolled discharge of the battery of a motor vehicle in the event of a defective initialization of an electronic control unit in the motor vehicle. The initialization process is monitored, and the result thereof controls a supply voltage which is fed via a voltage-monitoring line to a monitoring device of a bus-transceiver only when a successful initialization is detected, or the feeding or the generation of the supply voltage is interrupted when successful initialization is not detected. If the monitoring device does not detect the required supply voltage, e.g. at an appropriate time, then it cuts off power to the supply voltage unit that generates the supply voltage.