# Sending an ACH Prenotification

[ACH Prenotifications](/documentation/fedach) are a non-financial message sent via the ACH network. They’re sometimes called “prenotes” or $0 ACHs.

Historically, prenotifications were used to check if an account was valid before sending a transfer. That still works (banks are likely to return a prenotification to an non-existent account number as `R03` “No account”). The receiving bank is not, however, very likely to check if the accountholder’s name matches the fields in the ACH Transfer, though.

Like ACH transfers, there isn’t a positive acknowledgement from the receiving bank. `submitted` is the final happy-path status.

More modern approaches to checking account [ownership and access](/documentation/fedach#validating-an-account) include services like Plaid or sending low value microdeposits.

## Lifecycle

|                      |                                                                                                                                                                        |
| -------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `pending_submitting` | The prenotification is pending submission to the Federal Reserve.                                                                                                      |
| `submitted`          | The prenotification has been submitted to the Federal Reserve.                                                                                                         |
| `returned`           | The prenotification has been returned by the receiver.                                                                                                                 |
| `requires_attention` | A rare status set when a prenotification needs manual intervention from the Increase team. [More about requires\_attention](/documentation/requires-attention-status). |