When a change in sub-channel selection is made after a mobile/handheld (M/H) Frame is begun, an M/H receiver is for some time unable to correct byte errors by transverse Reed-Solomon (TRS) decoding of turbo decoding results. Despite this, later stages of the M/H receiver are supplied data that cyclic-redundancy-check (CRC) decoding of Internet protocol (IP) packets does not find to be in error. Some of the IP packets comprise Service Map Table (SMT)-mobile/handheld (MH) data used to update SMT determining how the M/H receiver is operated. SMT-MH data that have not been subjected to TRS byte-error correction are kept from updating the SMT until those SMT-MH data are verified by later SMT-MH data subjected to TRS byte-error correction. Transmitting total number of Groups (TNOG) information for the currently received M/H Frame in all its sub-frames speeds up acquisition of Fast Information Channel updates by the M/H receiver.