Why do we service caravans annually? It may seem a simple question, but depending on who you are, there could be several and at times opposing reasons.
When you buy a new caravan, the manufacturer usually offers you a manufacturers warranty. The customer perceives it as offering some protection against cost of parts and repairs when (not if) it goes wrong within the warranty period.
The manufacturers know from their historical records roughly how reliable their products are, and what typically what does go wrong. They have included an extra amount in the selling cost to cover most of the likely warranty issues. They also know if a service is performed in a timely manner, a significant number of those potential failures will be prevented. The manufacturer is basically profit motivated, so if they can get the customer to pay for an annual service which prevents a warranty claim, the manufacturer has not only protected their profit, but they have also increased the after sales revenue for their dealers.
I also suspect that some components on caravans are deliberately specified and constructed to just outlive the manufacturers warranty period, so they will need to be repaired or replaced just beyond the manufacturers warranty period. This pushes up the sales of exorbitantly priced spare parts.
We all probably know of some caravans that are used weekly, and some that are perhaps used just once a year, some that are kept on the same site and just visited from time to time, and many other combinations of use. Thus each of these scenarios will produce different wear and tear on the caravan and and its equipment. Consequently its difficult to produce a "one size fits all" maintenance programme which is totally justified to each caravan.
The annual service schemes are going to be a compromise for most people. It means some will be serviced before the wear and tear really demands it, and for a few it could mean the caravan is not receiving enough timely attention. The manufacturer's would claim this to be excessive usage.
In fact there is no legal requirement to have a private caravan serviced. The only thing you are legally required to do is to ensure it is in a safe roadworthy condition when it's on the highway.
Edit,
If a caravan is purchased using finance, the finance house may also put a requirement on the user to have it serviced. Again this is profit motivated, so the finance house has the greatest potential to recover the value should hire purchaser default on the agreement.
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