Caravan shared hundreds of times on Facebook isn’t part of any giveaway

A post on Facebook falsely claims that a caravan, which was not previously claimed after a different giveaway, will be given away for free to someone who comments on and shares the post. 

The post says: “Unfortunately, our previous winner Naomi Raynott V. doesn't follow our page and thus we have been unable to contact her for 14 days, we have been left with no choice but to give out the beautiful cabin once again to someone who Shares+Comments by Sunday 28 at 7p.m. Delivery is free within 6 weeks. [sic]”

But the caravan pictured in the post is not part of any giveaway, and is currently listed for sale by Cumbria-based caravan dealership Adventure Leisure Vehicles. 

Rick Parker, the company’s digital marketing manager, told Full Fact that the giveaway was nothing to do with Adventure Leisure Vehicles and that he had taken the pictures used in the Facebook post. 

Fake giveaways like these are very common on social media, and we have fact checked posts offering luxury caravans and motorhomes a number of times in the past—including a recent post also using pictures from Adventure Leisure vehicles. With genuine campervan lottery pages proving extremely popular online, the fake versions often rack up thousands of shares in a matter of hours. 

Another indication that all might not be as it seems with this most recent Facebook giveaway is the fact that the page replies to commenters, directing them to a different page which encourages them to like and share a different post, comment “done” and register through a third-party page. 

This is a common indication that the giveaway isn’t real, and we have written about posts making similar requests from social media users a number of times in the past. 

Other commercial giveaways, often in the form of free meals at popular chain restaurants such as Harvester or Greggs or cheap deals for items such as air fryers or electric scooters at retailers such as Argos, are also extremely common and we have fact checked them many times before. 

Posts using misleading images are some of the most common kinds of misinformation we see online, but they can sometimes be hard to spot. It’s always worth checking if a picture shows what the post says it does before you share it—we have written a guide on how to do so here.