Patent ID: 8406795

Claim:
A method of operating a communications device for use in a communications system Where beacon time slots occur on a periodic basis, a beacon signal being transmitted by a satellite base station during each beacon time slot according to a periodic downlink timing structure, said downlink timing structure including a plurality of superslots within each beacon slot, the individual superslots within a beacon slot being identifiable through the use of a superslot index, each superslot including a plurality of symbol transmission time periods, the method comprising: receiving at least one beacon signal from the satellite base station; processing the received beacon signal to determine a downlink timing reference point, superslots occurring within a beacon slot having a predetermined relationship to the determined downlink timing reference point; transmitting an access probe signal to said base station; receiving a response to the access probe signal from the base station, the response including information indicating at least one of: i) an amount of an indicated main superslot timing offset correction, the amount of the main superslot timing offset correction being an integer multiple of a superslot time period; ii) a superslot identifier indicating the position of a superslot within a beacon slot during which the base station received the access probe signal to which the received response corresponds; iii) an identifier that identifies the communications device which transmitted the access probe signal to which the received response corresponds or iv) an identifier that identifies the access probe to which the response being responding to; and performing a transmission timing adjustment as a function of the information included in the received response.