The invention relates to the organization of phase references in a data transfer system based upon the multiplexing of orthogonal frequency components, when transmissions in the said system are composed of relatively short symbol sequences. In accordance with the invention, in the first symbol (OS1) of the sequence differential phase-shift keying between elementary signals is carried out, based upon a phase reference (Ref) transmitted in one or several subfrequency bands (fc) and upon a phase shift chain propagated one subfrequency thereof at a time. In each subfrequency band in the subsequent symbols of the sequence phase-shift modulation refers to the elementary signal of the preceding symbol of the same subfrequency band. The invention may be applied with benefit to digital cellular network systems which employ the OFDM method.