I need to report a problem in the booking procedure that has led to a misunderstanding. I had to wait an hour outside before the hosts came to open the place for me. There was no one in the reception when I first visited the place nor when I came back to take my room. It's because they tried to reach me by phone while I could only be reached by email.
The cause of the problem is that, in the web form provided by Expedia, it is mandatory to provide a phone number. But what should the guest do when he has NO phone? I put a number that was, I hoped, clearly phoney but the hosts did not understand that. So it led to the misunderstanding. I had to get help from a random person of the neighbourhood, who was speaking both English and Croatian (which helped), to be able to call the hosts and solve the issue. Apparently, public phones are not common, around there.
In conclusion, I cannot blame the hosts for trying to contact me by phone and not realizing that I had sent text messages instead. But, Expedia, I suggest that you make the contact phone number optional in the reservation form or, to the very least, that you add some clickable button to allow the guest to properly indicate that he has no phone to be reached on.
