The equipment and techniques disclosed herein introduce a deferred acknowledgement (DACK), in the context of a protocol for a wireless station to request and obtain access to a wireless network resource for communication of one or more data packets. Essentially, a network node, such as a wireless base station, sends the DACK instruction in response to the access request telling the requesting station that the node has heard the request but that the requesting station should defer its transmission. The requesting station need not back off and re-initiate its access request. Instead, the requesting station waits for a later acknowledgement (ACK) granting access to a resource as requested. Although the DACK provides additional signaling, this technique can still utilize a fast ACK type message, that is to say a relatively short signaling packet.