Narrative:

Roughly 30nm from ziebr; ATC asked us if we were direct bkw at the time. I responded that we were never given direct bkw and were on our filed course. ATC responded that his paperwork showed our course to be shipr dct bkw. I told him our paperwork showed sdf FEDRA2 shipr dct ziebr J526 bkw J42 gve PAATS2 phl. I told him I would have to check with the company about the discrepancy. He then cleared us direct to bkw. This ATC controller then told me that this has apparently happened a lot with our company. We continued to kphl uneventfully. This event occurred because the current pre departure clearance clearance system enables easy confusion between filed route and cleared route. In a highly saturated busy cockpit environment; (such as the one we were in during our initial setup and departure) it is simply too easy to confuse the two. In this case; the new amended clearance route was -FEDRA2 shipr bkw -. This amended clearance was broken up between the bottom of page 1 and the top of page 2 of our pre departure clearance. If you review the actual pre departure clearance after our amended clearance it then continues with; ksdf FEDRA2 shipr ziebr* J526 bkw J42 gve ...kphl. *Climb via SID climb via SID* departure control 132.07 departure control. The repeat of our incomplete filed flight plan along with the use of *'s only add to the confusion. Add all of this together with a fast moving; highly saturated cockpit; the opportunity for confusion is elevated. Pre departure clearance clearances need to more clearly identify the actual cleared route. In this case the change in route in the pre departure clearance was just 1 line really. However it was spilt between page 1 and page 2 which made it all too easy to inadvertently skip over. When one calls for a clearance via normal comms; one is not read back the filed route. They are simply read back the cleared route. I feel this would be the most obvious fix. Personally; I will be more cautions when reviewing pdcs and will call over regular comms whenever I see a reroute.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: CRJ-900 Captain reported a track deviation due to what he termed a confusing PDC presentation.

Narrative: Roughly 30nm from ZIEBR; ATC asked us if we were direct BKW at the time. I responded that we were never given direct BKW and were on our filed course. ATC responded that his paperwork showed our course to be SHIPR DCT BKW. I told him our paperwork showed SDF FEDRA2 SHIPR DCT ZIEBR J526 BKW J42 GVE PAATS2 PHL. I told him I would have to check with the company about the discrepancy. He then cleared us direct to BKW. This ATC controller then told me that this has apparently happened a lot with our company. We continued to KPHL uneventfully. This event occurred because the current PDC clearance system enables easy confusion between filed route and cleared route. In a highly saturated busy cockpit environment; (such as the one we were in during our initial setup and departure) it is simply too easy to confuse the two. In this case; the new amended clearance route was -FEDRA2 SHIPR BKW -. This amended clearance was broken up between the bottom of page 1 and the top of page 2 of our PDC. If you review the actual PDC after our amended clearance it then continues with; KSDF FEDRA2 SHIPR ZIEBR* J526 BKW J42 GVE ...KPHL. *CLIMB VIA SID CLIMB VIA SID* DEPARTURE CONTROL 132.07 DEPARTURE CONTROL. The repeat of our incomplete filed flight plan along with the use of *'s only add to the confusion. Add all of this together with a fast moving; highly saturated cockpit; the opportunity for confusion is elevated. PDC clearances need to more clearly identify the actual cleared route. In this case the change in route in the PDC was just 1 line really. However it was spilt between page 1 and page 2 which made it all too easy to inadvertently skip over. When one calls for a clearance via normal comms; one is not read back the filed route. They are simply read back the cleared route. I feel this would be the most obvious fix. Personally; I will be more cautions when reviewing PDCs and will call over regular comms whenever I see a reroute.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.