receiving at an intermediate-network-node a data stream generated by a previous network node, wherein the received data stream includes constant bit rate (CBR) carrier streams, at least one of which comprises frames, respective CBR carrier streams corresponding to CBR signals received at a source node;

sampling a counter accumulating a Physical Layer (PHY)-scaled stream clock (IPSCk) at a nominal sampling period (Tps) of a local reference clock of the intermediate-network-node to obtain a cumulative PHY-scaled count (CPSC) of the received respective data stream, the IPSCk generated by scaling a clock recovered from the received respective data stream to a predetermined nominal frequency (Fipsck_nom);

calculating a PHY-scaled stream phase offset (PSPO) that indicates the phase difference between a PHY-scaled stream nominal bit count (LPSD) and an incoming PHY-scaled count delta (IPSD), where the IPSD indicates an increment between successive CPSCs;

demultiplexing the received data stream to obtain the CBR carrier streams, respective ones of the CBR carrier streams including a previous network node cumulative phase offset report (CPOR-P) that indicates a previous network node cumulative phase offset (CPO-P), and a client rate report (CRR) that indicates a measured bit count of a respective CBR client at the source node;

calculating a cumulative phase offset (CPO) for respective ones of the CBR carrier streams that is a function of the CPO-P for the respective CBR carrier stream and the calculated PSPO;

replacing CPO-P in respective ones of the CBR carrier streams with the calculated CPO for the respective CBR carrier stream, or a function of the calculated CPO for the respective CBR carrier stream, to generate an updated CPOR in place of the CPOR-P in the respective CBR carrier stream;

multiplexing the CBR carrier streams into intermediate-network-node data streams; and

transmitting the intermediate-network-node data streams from the particular intermediate-network-node.