A great many homes on Orihuela Costa are quads, bungalows and apartments around a communal pool. The walk from your door to the water is thirty seconds, so nobody takes their keys, and plenty of front doors lock themselves when they close. Then the door clicks shut behind you, and you are standing in a swimsuit with a towel and nothing else.
It happens often enough to have a routine.
1. Check every door before anything else
Walk round. Is the terrace slider open? The upstairs window of a bungalow with an outside staircase? A porch door that only latches? Do not climb anything that is not a staircase, and do not try to lift a slider off its track; a slider forced from outside is a repair bill, not a way in.
2. Borrow a phone
The pool is the best place on the complex to be locked out, because there are people at it. Ask a neighbour. Most people on these complexes have done it themselves or know someone who has. If the complex has a pool attendant or a caretaker, ask them too; they may know whether the community president keeps contact numbers for owners.
3. Ring the right people, in the right order
- If you rent or are on holiday: ring the owner, the agency or the manager first. They may have a spare key nearby, and they will need to confirm to a locksmith that you are staying there.
- If it is your home: think about who has a key. A neighbour, a cleaner, a key holder. A ten-minute walk to fetch a key costs nothing.
- If nobody has a key: ring a locksmith. Give the number you are calling from, so you can be rung back on it.
4. Proving it is your door, in a swimsuit
You will be asked to show that you have the right to be inside, and your passport is on the kitchen table. That is fine. What helps:
- the owner or agency confirming your booking by phone;
- a neighbour or the community president who knows you;
- your passport or residence card, looked at as soon as the door swings open.
5. Paying when your wallet is inside too
The price is agreed with you before any work starts, and you are not expected to have money in your swimming costume. Payment can be made once the door is open and your card or phone is back in your hand: cash, card or Bizum.
How to stop it happening again
- Leave the latch off when you go down to the pool, if your door has a night latch that locks on closing.
- Wear the key. A waterproof key pouch on a wrist strap costs a few euros.
- Give a key to someone you trust on the complex. One person, named, not a key under the plant pot.
Holiday-let owners will recognise this from the other side; there is more on the guest side in what a summer of guests does to a lock and, for lets with keypads, when the smart lock goes flat.
When you do get hold of a phone, the emergency locksmith page explains what to say in the first minute. If the door that locked you out is one you never trusted, look at opening without breaking the lock and how a door is opened before you decide what to do about it.