Systems and methods for removing phase shifts due to hierarchical modulation to improve synchronization and performance in legacy and hierarchical decoders are presented. To compensate for the effects of hierarchical modulation, such methods include receiving an I,Q symbol that has been further modulated by an overlay phase shift, detecting the direction of the overlay phase shift, de-rotating the symbol by a defined angle corresponding to the overlay phase shift and said direction; and passing the symbol to legacy synchronization and forward error correction decoding stages after said de-rotating. An exemplary receiver can be provided to implement the disclosed methods.