M3 is an accounting and analytics platform designed for the hospitality industry. It allows you to manage the accounting for your entire property portfolio as it includes time tracking, accounts payable (A/P) and accounts receivable (A/R), financial management, and the ability to integrate with human resources (HR), payroll, and property management systems.
It even has its own full-time accounting staff if you want to outsource your bookkeeping. Its support services are also exceptional, with both implementation support and training for hoteliers with an accounting team. To get pricing, you’ll have to request a free demo.
The Fit Small Business editorial policy is rooted in our mission to provide you with the best answers to your small business questions. We offer accurate, impartial, and helpful information that you can trust when choosing hotel accounting software. That said, we developed an internal scoring rubric that allows us to properly score each software across a predetermined set of categories. This helps us provide in-depth analysis and insights into the hotel accounting software’s performance and provide you with accurate recommendations based on your business needs.
Pros
- Option to manage your own books or outsource to an M3 accountant
- Strong support service options
- Ability to customize financial reports
- Track construction project costs and set up budgets
Cons
- Pricing isn’t transparent
- No free trial
- Software can be overwhelming to novice users
- No mobile app available for Accounting
M3 Accounting Alternatives & Comparisons
Pricing | Booking Engine | Mobile App | Payments Channel | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quote-based | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ |
 | Starts at $250 per month | ✓ | ✕ | ✕ |
 | Quote-based | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
 | Starts at $90 per month for Plus | ✕ | ✓ | Via third-party integration |
Best For | Learn More | |
|---|---|---|
 | Managing a hotel portfolio: Managing the accounting of multiple hotels or hostels is easier with Nimble Property. With one account, you can easily add multiple hotels and manage the finances of each property in a single platform. | |
 | Online booking: Though M3 Accounting offers excellent hotel financial reporting, some hotel owners may find a built-in booking engine a more attractive feature. This feature enables users to track incoming bookings, estimate revenues, and manage hotel operations. | |
 | Small hotels with basic accounting needs: Nimble Property has complexities in its hotel accounting features and may not be suitable if you manage small boutique hotels. QuickBooks Online is more suitable for small hotels because of its simplicity and robustness in essential accounting features. |
Are you interested in learning about other accounting platforms? Check out our recommendations for the best small business accounting software.
M3 Accounting Reviews From Users
| Users Like | Users Dislike |
|---|---|
| Easy to use | Outdated interface |
| Report templates | Slow report generation |
| A/P management | |
After extensive research, we found out that there are only very few user reviews about M3 Accounting. These reviews only come from Software Advice1 and M3 Accounting’s rating is 4.7 out of 5 stars based on 10 reviews. We can’t provide an expert opinion about these reviews since there are no recent reviews in the past six months.
M3 Accounting vs Competitors
As part of our best hotel accounting software buyer’s guide, we reviewed and compared Cloudbeds with its top competitors in the industry today.
M3 Accounting vs Competitors
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M3 Accounting: Custom Quote
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Nimble Property: Custom Quote
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QuickBooks Online: Starts at $90 per month for Plus plan
M3 Accounting scored fair in all aspects of our evaluation. It’s a bit behind Nimble Property in accounting features but we don’t see the difference as a big deal. Both Nimble Property and M3 Accounting have great accounting features but QuickBooks Online remains the best pick for accounting features. Moreover, M3 Accounting’s score in hotel management features would’ve been better if it had a mobile app. Overall, M3 Accounting is a good pick because it can integrate with its business intelligence software called M3 Insights.
M3 Accounting Pricing
To receive information about M3 Accounting’s pricing for both the software and support services, you must request a free demo. A free trial is currently unavailable.
M3 Accounting Features
M3 Accounting has a variety of strong features, including the ability to set sales tax rates and track vendor payments, customize reports, handle A/P duties, reconcile your accounts, and set budgets. You can also outsource your accounting and integrate M3 with its labor management software and business insight tool.
M3 Accounting allows you to set sales tax rates for vendor invoices easily. You can also track vendor payments and print data on Forms 1099 and 1096 automatically. M3 Accounting’s Report Writer customizes your reports to extract the desired data.
Customize your daily reports with automatic property management system (PMS) reporting and daily report rollover. You can also customize the general ledger (GL) and chart of accounts.
M3 Accounting automates the check writing process, makes vendor payments across multiple properties via automated clearing house (ACH) and virtual credit cards, and reconciles your bank accounts. Forecast future sales accurately by creating multiple forecasts with metrics for comparison across periods.
If you’re planning a construction project, M3 can assist with setting up budgets and tracking costs, including the ability to attach vendor invoices to each project. You can set up budgets with key metrics and a feature to lock metrics, ensuring the stay consistent across properties.
Hotel Management Features
In our evaluation of hotel management features, M3 Accounting wins in hotel financial reporting but takes a little step back in hotel operations. We like the synergy between M3 Accounting and M3 Insight (M3’s business intelligence software) in creating meaningful reports. However, M3 Accounting doesn’t have built-in hotel operations features that enable users to track bookings and manage hotel housekeeping.
The provider did say that they can integrate with 32 PMS so we gave them half a point for that in our evaluation.
Using a personalized dashboard, you can streamline labor management with M3’s cloud-based reporting system. You’ll be given access to on-demand management of associate earnings, including biometric capabilities. You can prepare payroll, set custom rules, and track performance to see what works and what doesn’t. Take note that this software is not included in M3 Accounting.
Available as additional software, M3 Insight pulls data from M3 Accounting Core, Labor Management, PMS systems, and other available data integrations. You can import your data automatically from any application programming interface (API) to collect all of your information in one location. Take note that this software is not included in M3 Accounting.
If you need to transition from another platform, M3 can assist with that. Training can be performed virtually, on-site, or in one of M3’s offices. The account setup is based on the growth cycle of your hotel or company.
Available for both iOS and Android, M3’s mobile apps provide access to the Insight and Labor modules. With Insight, you can toggle between prior year or budget comparisons quickly to view variances based on different time periods. With Labor, employees can view their schedules and work history and the property manager has access to labor variances and employee time details. There are no accounting features available on the mobile app.
M3 Accounting Ease of Use
M3 Accounting’s ease of use takes the win over its competitors in terms of assisted bookkeeping and software onboarding. We like that it offers bookkeeping services performed by bookkeeping experts in the hospitality industry. However, M3 Accounting’s limited integration with other platforms such as customer relationship management is one of the main reasons why its ease of use score took a slight hit in our evaluation.
To contact customer support, you can submit a ticket online or call its customer service line, which is available from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern time, Monday through Friday, and 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. ET on Saturday. M3 also has a searchable knowledge base with documentation and videos, and it hosts free monthly webinars.
Assisted Bookkeeping and Integrations
M3’s team of accountants specializes in the hospitality industry and will work with you in whatever capacity is needed—whether that is handling your company’s day-to-day bookkeeping or managing your books on a monthly basis. Services include sending monthly financial reports, A/P, daily bank reconciliations, sales/use/occupancy tax filing, and analytical reviews.
M3 partners with several property management integrations, including Mews, RMS Cloud PMS, Oracle OPERA PMS, WebRezPro, StayNTouch, RoomKey PMS, Maestro PMS, Jonas Chorum, Visual Matrix PMS, and HotelKey PMS.
How We Evaluated M3 Accounting
As part of our best hotel accounting software buyer’s guide, we evaluated M3 Accounting in four key areas: pricing, accounting features, hotel management features, and ease of use.
20% of Overall Score
Price is an important component of every small business decision. In our evaluation, we placed more emphasis on providers that have a transparent pricing structure. However, we don’t discredit providers who’d like to keep their pricing confidential or those that offer a custom pricing model.
40% of Overall Score
The best hotel accounting software should have enough accounting features to cater to a hotelier’s daily accounting needs. We considered the following subcriteria: general features, A/P, A/R, fixed assets, inventory, and basic financial reporting.
20% of Overall Score
While our focus is hotel accounting, having hotel management features included in software is a big plus. Hence, we award points to providers that include features, such as hotel booking, housekeeping, hotel financial planning, and revenue management.
20% of Overall Score
Our ease-of-use evaluation revolves around customer support, integration, and expert analysis. For customer support, we’d like to see multiple support channels that enable users to contact the provider in case of problems. Users should be able to contact the support team by phone, email, or live chat. If direct contact is unavailable, there must be alternatives like a detailed knowledge base or help center and chatbot for quick assistance.
Having the ability to integrate the software with other apps is a good addition to overall ease of use. Customer feedback from user review websites is also included in our rubric to corroborate our findings with actual user feedback. However, we remain neutral and fair in considering reviews as some tend to be one-sided or focused on the negative.
Lastly, we include our expert analysis score based on our evaluation of the software and on the information made available to perform a full review.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
M3 Accounting is an accounting platform designed for the hospitality industry. It has features that help hotel managers and owners review the overall financial performance of the business.
No, but you may request a demo from them to learn more about the software.
Bottom Line
M3 Accounting is a cloud-based hotel accounting software that integrates with other hotel management systems. M3 also offers labor management software and a tool for tracking business insights. The accounting, labor management, and insight software integrate with one another and are complemented by mobile apps. On the services side, you can outsource your bookkeeping to M3’s seasoned accountants and also receive assistance with training and implementation.
Source of User Review:
1Software Advice
