What was claimed
Facebook users have the chance to win a Center Parcs holiday by interacting with a post.
Our verdict
False. No such promotion is being offered by the company.
Facebook promotions offering free Center Parcs holidays for sharing posts are false
15 December 2022
Two Facebook posts falsely claim that Center Parcs is offering the chance to win free holidays to anyone who likes, shares and comments on them.
One, which appears on a page titled “Center Parcs Longleat Forest” says: “Hello everyone I'm Colin McKinlay, the new CEO of Center Parcs. I want to start my job off with a good deed this Christmas. I'll be sending someone who shares&likes then types 'Done' by Dec 23rd a 5 night holiday for 8 at a Center Parcs of their choice [sic]”.
The post is accompanied by a photograph of Mr McKinlay, who became CEO of the company in April 2022, and images of some Center Parcs facilities.
Full Fact was first alerted to this post after an almost identical post was shared by another page also called “Center Parcs Longleat Forest”. This post amassed 16,000 shares in five days, before both the post and the page were deleted and this new page was set up. At the time of writing, the new post has been live for just a few hours and already amassed more than 1,000 shares.
The other post, which also appears on a page titled “Center Parcs Longleat Forest”, says: “We have a 7 night holiday for 4 @ Center Parcs Longest [sic] and we're giving it to someone who types ‘Done’ today!”
Those who respond to the post are told they must validate their entry but are then taken to a separate page that offers rewards for completing surveys and has no apparent connection to Center Parcs.
A spokesperson for Center Parcs told Full Fact: “We are aware of a competition circulating on Facebook and we are in no way affiliated with this page or any of the content (like the competitions) it is publishing.”
The spokesperson added that anyone responding to such a post would not be entered into a competition for a holiday and that, in any case, the company only offers three or four-night breaks.
Center Parcs issued warnings about similar posts earlier this year on its official Facebook page, pointing out that there are no pages for specific Center Parcs locations and suggested that anyone who comes across such pages should report them to the company.
There are some clues that the Center Parcs Longleat Forest pages which share these false competitions are not real Center Parcs pages. In both cases the pages have only been created in the past few days and have only shared one post.
Image courtesy of Chris Thomson
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because Center Parcs is not running any such competition and has no connection to the posts.