Narrative:

Upon being issued a clearance via pre departure clearance from bos clearance delivery; the captain and myself verified what we thought was the correct clearance and entered it into our flight management systems. The pre departure clearance (pre-departure clearance delivery system) delivered our ATC clearance and when compared to the filed flight plan route printout from our flight planning software; all information seemed to be correct. After finishing the departure procedure and vacating bos immediate airspace we continued upon what we thought was our filed and cleared routing. That routing was as follows: PATTS1.pats departure from bos runway 9 glyde baf teb then on to our destination. Shortly after reaching baf and turning on course to teb boston queried us as to the clearance limit we had received from bos clearance delivery. We complied with the controllers request and informed [them] our clearance had glyde-baf-teb. The controller then came back with the route that we should be on and issued instructions to get us back on that routing. The new instructions were V292 sages V489. We complied with all ATC instructions given and preceded on the new routing via a heading and ultimately a direct to huo. The rest of the flight was without incident. The controller told us in the future to always query ATC if a direct is given in a clearance in boston/new york airspace. I believe our error was due in part to the formatting provided by the pre departure clearance issued clearance. Possibly the page of the clearance containing the latter part of our route was missed because of its sequence in the pre departure clearance delivery message. Perhaps a different format or a full route clearance (in comparison to a partial route clearance and an 'as filed') could have prevented us from following the incorrect navigation track and allowed us to 'catch' our mistake prior to any corrective action being taken by ATC. In addition to pre departure clearance message clarification perhaps a more stringent ATC preferred route system would eliminate a need for continued multiple navigation verifications by both pilot and controller.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A First Officer reported deviating from cleared route because of PDC confusion.

Narrative: Upon being issued a clearance via PDC from BOS clearance delivery; the Captain and myself verified what we thought was the correct clearance and entered it into our Flight Management Systems. The PDC (Pre-Departure Clearance Delivery SYSTEM) delivered our ATC clearance and when compared to the filed flight plan route printout from our flight planning software; all information seemed to be correct. After finishing the departure procedure and vacating BOS immediate airspace we continued upon what we thought was our filed and cleared routing. That routing was as follows: PATTS1.PATS Departure from BOS Runway 9 GLYDE BAF TEB then on to our destination. Shortly after reaching BAF and turning on course to TEB Boston queried us as to the clearance limit we had received from BOS Clearance Delivery. We complied with the Controllers request and informed [them] our clearance had GLYDE-BAF-TEB. The Controller then came back with the route that we should be on and issued instructions to get us back on that routing. The new instructions were V292 SAGES V489. We complied with all ATC instructions given and preceded on the new routing via a heading and ultimately a direct to HUO. The rest of the flight was without incident. The Controller told us in the future to always query ATC if a direct is given in a clearance in BOSTON/NEW YORK Airspace. I believe our error was due in part to the formatting provided by the PDC issued clearance. Possibly the page of the clearance containing the latter part of our route was missed because of its sequence in the PDC Delivery Message. Perhaps a different format or a full route clearance (in comparison to a partial route clearance and an 'As Filed') could have prevented us from following the incorrect navigation track and allowed us to 'catch' our mistake prior to any corrective action being taken by ATC. In addition to PDC message clarification perhaps a more stringent ATC preferred route system would eliminate a need for continued multiple navigation verifications by both Pilot and Controller.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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.