a first predefined threshold determined at step s 5 and the per metric exceeds a second predefined threshold determined at step s 6 over a given period e g 30 seconds then this is an indication of congestion whether or not congestion is detected based on the criteria as set forth above or employing other techniques for determining congestion the present invention provides the following actions first the ap at step s 7 sorts all wtrus in the basic service set bss in order of the amount of time spent trying to retransmit wasted time is preferably determined in accordance with the wasted time algorithm alg wt set forth below more specifically a set or list of wtrus with unacknowledged packets is created for each unacknowledged packet to a wtrus the sum of all the wasted time spent trying to transmit and re transmit the packet i e packet size packet transmission rate plus a penalty for each retransmitted packet is recorded the penalty reflects the increasing delay associated with retransmissions i e the backoff time due to the doubling of the congestion window cw the penalty represents the added delay incurred from the time the packet is ready for transmission to the time the packet is actually transmitted over the medium this retransmit time metric is therefore much greater for stations wasting.