A method of performing a modified RLP that reduces the transmission delay in a communications system by detecting frame erasures when they occur. The modified RLP method requests retransmission of erased frames based on pattern violations instead of sequence number violations. The method is preconditioned to expect a particular repeating pattern of frame delivery. For a system running a VSELP vocoder, the method in a receiving device expects to receive full rate or data (F) and DTX (D) frames in a repeating pattern FFDFFDFFD. For a system running an AMBE vocoder, the method in a receiving device expects to receive frames in a repeating pattern DFDFDFDD. The method detects when the pattern is violated and in desired instances immediately requests retransmission of the expected frame.