Alexban,
I appreciate what you're trying to say, but I think you may have missed the point somewhat: The word "Cleared" was not used in the initial instruction, meaning that it was not a Clearance but an instruction. The problem is that some crews appear to be "interpreting" it as a Clearance, which in my eyes holds potential dangers!
Tinstaafl's point about the Clearance Limit is valid here, although again it was not strictly a Clearance, and I do agree with what you said with:
"
why not saying :clear to xx,mantain fl .. and expect ils rwy ..? "
Perhaps I should elaborate a little here. Although in my initial query I said that this was happening on first contact with the i/b aircraft, it is more accurate to say that it is happening on handover from the previous sector; first contact is invariably about a half-hour previous to this when the flights check-in for airfield/landing data, at which time they are advised of the runway in use and the type of approach to
expect.
So the point here is that they already know which type of approach, and I'm not being argumentative about this at all, I was merely querying the apparent
interpretation by some of what I had thought to be an unambiguous instruction!
Old Smokey, thanks or that info by the way, much appreciated. Not generally the sort of thing they teach you in the College. Every little bit helps though.
