A User Equipment (UE) includes processing circuitry coupled to memory. To configure the UE for machine type communication (MTC), the processing circuitry is to decode radio resource control (RRC) signaling from a base station (such as an Evolved Node-B (eNB)). The RRC signaling indicates activation of flexible starting physical resource block (PRB) for physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) resource allocation. DCI received on an MTC physical downlink control channel (MPDCCH) is decoded, the DCI indicating a narrowband (NB) index of a NB frequency resource and at least one PRB index for the PDSCH resource allocation. The NB frequency resource indicated by the NB index is shifted based on the activation of the flexible starting PRB for PDSCH resource allocation. PDSCH data received from the base station using the shifted NB frequency resource is decoded.