In the paper, phase noise and its effects on a quadrature-phase-modulated carrier is studied. The functions of the receiver carrier recovery loop when operated in a time-division multiple-access channel are explained. In this case, the bursts received from various earth stations via satellite need to be dealt with in a rather short time frame, so that the information required for carrier phase recovery can be extracted promptly. A procedure for obtaining the phase-noise spectral density is developed and examined by an example.