Microsoft admits blunder over severance pay

Microsoft has admitted it made a mistake after asking 25 former employees to repay part of their redundancy pay.

The software giant wrote to the US-based employees following a round of redundancies to say an accounting error meant they had been paid too much severance money.

Despite initially asking for the cash back, Microsoft has now backtracked.

A Microsoft spokesman said: “We should have handled this situation in a more thoughtful manner. We are reaching out to those impacted to relay that we will not seek any payment from those individuals.”