Issues with locking/unlocking car

[theimaginaryduck]

Hi folks, I recently got a 2003 polo as my first car So apologies if this seems a really stupid thing to ask; I'm still learning about how cars work..!

So, whenever I try to unlock my car, if I turn the key once, it only unlocks the driver side door. If I turn it again, it unlocks all doors, but sets off the car alarm! What the heck am I doing wrong? How do I unlock all the doors without annoying the neighbours?

Other than that, fantastic car, and really enjoying driving it!

[RUM4MO]

There should be a short delay before the alarm is triggered, maybe 10 seconds, so once you know that, you should have enough time to open the door and get the key into the ignition switch and turn it.

It could be that a previous owner has reduced that delay to zero in a bid to upset any would be car thief.

If you had access to VCDS or someone that has it, they could change the way the door locking/unlocking works in respect to "first single opening" and then "all doors opening".

I thought that VW Polos of that age all came from factory with "all doors opening" on the first turn of the driver's door barrel, or in most other cases, a single press of the key fob "unlock" button - though maybe it was the other way, anyway with my wife's current 2015 VW Polo it unlocks all doors from a single press.

Edit:- one thing that I forgot to understand fully, if you double unlock the driver's door lock and not open any doors, does the alarm still go off?

Is there not a "lock/unlock" button on the driver's side door? If so if you stick with a single door unlock and get inside, then with the key in the ignition, press that unlock button to unlock all the other doors - would/does that stop the alarm going off?