Back in the days when the AAR element of the AT/AAR world had a bit more autonomy, it was quite common to bring back some of the trail-support personnel in the back of a VC10K without too much interference from movers, watchers or any other no-you-can't-ists. But rarely did the Gp planners think about planning the jet into anywhere other than Brize.
But it didn't take very much effort to check whether there was sufficient fuel/CDT to take the FJ mates where they actually wanted to go. Having once been on the $hitty end of the stick myself waiting for MT from Wattisham to brave the Cotswolds, this was a particular bugbear of mine and I invariably tried to secure approval to land at the customers' own base. This was invariably accepted if it was do-able; in those days we had a reputation of being a 'can-do, will-do' outfit not under the leaden hand of the truckie world. We just used to tell them "You get the crash cover and customs sorted, we'll drop you off!". As well as suggesting that "We don't want to hear the
actual crash cover when we call up on arrival.....so have a quiet word with the Air Traffickers, please, if you get my drift
"
Sadly, these days there just doesn't seem to be the flex as the inbound jet might be needed for another task very soon after arrival - something which an intermediate landing elsewhere simply wouldn't permit.
Mind you, our independence of spirit was occasionally a bit much for some. On landing at Gutersludge once, the co-pilot mate who was looking after the cabin (before the jobsworths banned such things) was interested to see someone in KD coming up the steps.
"Yes, what do you want?" he enquired.
"I'm Fg Off xxxx, the DAMO"
"The DAMO - what's that then?"
"Duty Air Movements Officer. Now, where are your pax, the manifests, the ALM....."
"Listen mate, we're tankers. So just f*** off, will you!"