A technique includes communicating with a base station via a transmitter and a receiver of a first client device based on a static schedule. The static schedule indicates an uplink time and a downlink time allocated to the first client device and associated with each of multiple frames of the base station. Communication time between the base station and multiple client devices linked to the base station including the first client device is divided into multiple frames. A mode request signal is transmitted or received and performs one of: (i) requesting operation in a sleep mode for a selected number S of the frames, and (ii) indicating operation in a standby mode. An initiate signal is transmitted from the first client device to the base station via the transmitter and indicates when to begin operating in the one of the sleep mode and the standby mode.