The invention relates to a method for communicating digital data using an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transmission system (10) including at least one transmitter (600, 601) and receivers (700, 701). The method comprises selecting a mode of operation in a transmitter among at least one mode, each mode of operation being associated with a number of active carriers for payload data transmission, selecting a symbol interleaver in the transmitter from a set of symbol interleavers for symbol interleaving in said selected mode of operation, applying symbol interleaving in the transmitter on blocks of data units, mapping the interleaved data units onto the active carriers of said selected mode of operation, receiving the interleaved data units in the receiver, recognizing in the receiver the symbol interleaver used in the data transmission, selecting a de-interleaver in the receiver to correspond to the recognized symbol interleaver, and de-interleaving in the receiver the received data units using the selectedde-interleaver.