text: Pre-alert is a means of notifying importer about his goods arriving. Say, You are importer in US and expect shipment to arrive for you from Indonesia. You ask your shipping company/customs broker/ import clearance broker to give you a pre-alert on arriving shipments. They'll usually notify you thrre-four days before the shipment arrives, so that you are able to prepare all customs documents for customs clearance.\n\nHope this helps.\nGood luck.