A multi-carrier receiver, which may be utilized for receiving MC-CDMA signals, projects the received signal onto each subcarrier and onto a selected number of adjacent subcarriers. The signals resulting from the projection are combined and decoded to provide a decision statistic signal. The decision statistic signal is evaluated to determine an estimated bit value over each bit length in the transmitted signal. The receiver exploits the effects of imperfections in the communications channel such as fast fading, Doppler and frequency offsets and phase noise, to account for the dispersion of signal energy from a subcarrier to one or more adjacent subcarriers.