hotmetal, unfortunately there are always the breed that don't do the ideal and somehow manage to abuse even the simplest of instructions so by overcontrolling, we know we are certain to get the desired levels with the minimum of fuss. Just this morning I got a correct readback for making FL150 by TIGER and the next transmission from me was "make the level restriction and reduce speed when able, 20 minute delay" to get the response "disregard the level restriction and pulling the speed back". English speaking LHR based shorthaul a/c. Fortunately it wasn't too busy so the added RTF didn't impact on my tasks.