$re = '/^(\|MIGRATE\|)/';
$str = '|MIGRATE|;|10000|;|2ACC0003|;|30/09/13|;|Positive Adjmt.|;||;|MIGRATE|;|95004U';
$subst = "$1;|MIG_IN|";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php