Narrative:

Aircraft X departed [with] standard routing. The aircraft checked on climbing to 150; 360 heading; 250 kts (all standard). I then climbed the aircraft to FL230. Shortly thereafter; I cleared him 'direct zzzzz; resume normal airspeed.' the pilot advised that zzzzz was not on his route; that his next filed fix was ZZZ. While that's true; he had filed ZZZ..; the zzzzz routing was listed in blue and should have been issued in his original clearance. I advised him to put zzzzz in the box and proceed direct and that I had a revision to his routing beyond that; when he was ready to copy. He asked me to spell zzzzz for him; which I did. Once he had zzzzz in and was proceeding direct; he advised he was ready for the revision. I then cleared him; which he correctly read back. It should be noted that english clearly was not this pilot's first language; making all this communication somewhat laborious. On high-climbers (FL240 or higher) over ZZZ; [the center] has an automated information transfer (ait) procedure within the SOP. The aircraft is flashed to sector xx who then flashes it on to sector xy. I honestly don't remember if I did or I didn't flash the aircraft to anyone; but I don't believe I did. At some point I saw that sector xy had the handoff and shipped the aircraft to them. The aircraft entered sector xx at or very near FL230 without a handoff or pointout. While I like the ait procedure in general; this may be an example of a problem with it. After a million times using it; you tend to look for sector xy having track control and ship him; regardless of how it got to that point. Also; and again I'm not sure; I believe I never flashed him to anyone. If that's the case; the data block auto-flashed to xy based on route and requested final altitude; bypassing xx entirely. In my opinion this is unsafe. If there's an ait it needs to flash as per the ait; or not at all. Certainly I'd notice that I still have track control and initiate either a proper handoff procedure or a pointout.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Enroute Controller described a probable airspace infraction when utilizing the long established AIT procedure.

Narrative: Aircraft X departed [with] standard routing. The aircraft checked on climbing to 150; 360 heading; 250 kts (all standard). I then climbed the aircraft to FL230. Shortly thereafter; I cleared him 'direct ZZZZZ; resume normal airspeed.' The pilot advised that ZZZZZ was not on his route; that his next filed fix was ZZZ. While that's true; he had filed ZZZ..; The ZZZZZ routing was listed in blue and should have been issued in his original clearance. I advised him to put ZZZZZ in the box and proceed direct and that I had a revision to his routing beyond that; when he was ready to copy. He asked me to spell ZZZZZ for him; which I did. Once he had ZZZZZ in and was proceeding direct; he advised he was ready for the revision. I then cleared him; which he correctly read back. It should be noted that English clearly was not this pilot's first language; making all this communication somewhat laborious. On high-climbers (FL240 or higher) over ZZZ; [the Center] has an Automated Information Transfer (AIT) procedure within the SOP. The aircraft is flashed to sector XX who then flashes it on to sector XY. I honestly don't remember if I did or I didn't flash the aircraft to anyone; but I don't believe I did. At some point I saw that sector XY had the handoff and shipped the aircraft to them. The aircraft entered sector XX at or very near FL230 without a handoff or pointout. While I like the AIT procedure in general; this may be an example of a problem with it. After a million times using it; you tend to look for sector XY having track control and ship him; regardless of how it got to that point. Also; and again I'm not sure; I believe I never flashed him to anyone. If that's the case; the data block auto-flashed to XY based on route and requested final altitude; bypassing XX entirely. In my opinion this is unsafe. If there's an AIT it needs to flash as per the AIT; or not at all. Certainly I'd notice that I still have track control and initiate either a proper handoff procedure or a pointout.

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.