An A320 first officer reported he and his captain misread a poorly printed pre departure clearance a...

Narrative:

Pre departure clearance printout appeared to read maintain 3;000 ft when it should have shown 9;000 ft. On contact with departure we stated that we were climbing to 3;000 ft and departure did not question it. After being level at 3;000 ft for approx one to two minutes; departure asked if we were cleared to 9;000. We told him we were cleared to 3;000. He asked if that was assigned by tower. We told him 'no' and stated that it was from our pre departure clearance. He then cleared us to 9;000. After reviewing ACARS we saw that it was 9;000 and printed out another copy which clearly showed 9;000. We let departure know that we found where the error was and asked if there was any conflict. He stated that there was no problem and sent us off to the next frequency. There is an 'at or above 4;000' constraint departure that we passed at 3;000 due to this error. Poor printing on the pre departure clearance printout making cleared altitude to appear to be 3;000 instead of 9;000. Second copy printed better.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An A320 First Officer reported he and his Captain misread a poorly printed PDC and leveled off at a lower than cleared altitude on departure.

Narrative: PDC printout appeared to read maintain 3;000 FT when it should have shown 9;000 FT. On contact with Departure we stated that we were climbing to 3;000 FT and Departure did not question it. After being level at 3;000 FT for approx one to two minutes; Departure asked if we were cleared to 9;000. We told him we were cleared to 3;000. He asked if that was assigned by Tower. We told him 'No' and stated that it was from our PDC. He then cleared us to 9;000. After reviewing ACARS we saw that it was 9;000 and printed out another copy which clearly showed 9;000. We let Departure know that we found where the error was and asked if there was any conflict. He stated that there was no problem and sent us off to the next frequency. There is an 'At or Above 4;000' constraint departure that we passed at 3;000 due to this error. Poor printing on the PDC printout making cleared altitude to appear to be 3;000 instead of 9;000. Second copy printed better.

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.

Attributes
ACN	897394
Time
Date	201007
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	A320
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Initial Climb Climb
Person 1
Function	First Officer Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Altitude Crossing Restriction Not Met Deviation - Altitude Undershoot Deviation - Procedural Clearance

An A320 first officer reported he and his captain misread a poorly printed pre departure clearance and leveled off at a lower than cleared altitude on departure.