A high-flying finance boss who was sacked over an argument about his £30,000 annual bonus has won £118,000 in compensation.   

Andrew Blyth was sacked from his £120,000-a-year director job in a ‘redundancy sham’ after he became embroiled in a bitter row over his bonus. 

The accountant told company owner Courtenay Morison that he didn’t think his bonus was ‘fair’ for the year and that it should have been much higher.

Mr Blyth’s annual bonuses were around £30,000, a tribunal heard.

After being ‘disgruntled and upset’ about the complaints, Mr Morison, chairman and director of Clockwork, a successful removals firm, removed Mr Blyth in a fake redundancy.

He even searched online for ‘Legitimate Reasons for Director Redundancy’ the morning before he ousted Mr Blyth from the business.

Now, at an employment tribunal held in Edinburgh, Scotland, Mr Blyth has won £118,223 for unfair dismissal.

Edinburgh-based Mr Blyth was working as the Group Finance Director for Clockwork Group Holdings until he was dismissed in December 2025.

Andrew Blyth (pictured) was sacked from his £ 120,000-a-year finance director job in a ‘redundancy sham’ after he became embroiled in a bitter row over his £30,000 bonus

The accountant told company owner Courtenay Morison (pictured) that he didn’t think his bonus was ‘fair’ for the year and that it should have been much higher.

Clockwork describes itself as ‘one of the leading UK removals and storage companies’.

In November 2025, Mr Blyth had emailed Mr Morison about his views on the calculations of his bonus for that year, saying that it was ‘unfair’ and should be much higher.

Mr Blyth’s annual salary was £120,000, and his general annual bonus was around £30,000 a year.

After Mr Blyth said that they were not going to ‘completely agree’ because they had already discussed this issue, Mr Morison said that they had agreed the bonus 12 months ago.

Mr Morison said: ‘No that is not right or fair. We agreed the bonus 12 months ago. I’m not changing what was agreed back then. 

‘You’d be furious if I changed the goal posts if the other way round.

‘I’m becoming more disgruntled/upset with your attitude to what you perceive to be right and fair. I think you need to seriously look at your position.’

Mr Morison then completely cut contact with Mr Blyth until six days later, even though they would normally have contact most days.

He invited Mr Blyth to a meeting, which lasted five minutes, and he said that he was making him redundant.

On the morning, just a few hours before the meeting, Mr Morison sent messages to HR saying he had researched ‘legitimate reasons for director redundancy’.

Giving evidence at the tribunal, Mr Morison said that he had been thinking about making Mr Blyth redundant for months because the company could no longer afford to keep his position.

However, Employment Judge Jacqueline McCluskey said that he could not have been thinking about the redundancy for months as he had only searched the redundancy the morning of his meeting with Mr Blyth.

She said: ‘His evidence was that he had been thinking about doing so for a period of months. 

‘His evidence was that this was because there were three qualified accountants in the accounts team, the accounts team was top heavy and by making [his] post redundant he could make a saving of over £148,000.’

She ruled that Mr Blyth had been unfairly dismissed because Mr Morison had acted in ‘bad faith’ by trying to ‘dress up the dismissal as redundancy’ when he was annoyed about him trying to renegotiate his bonus.

Judge McCluskey said: ‘The Tribunal concluded that the operative reason in the mind of Mr Morison when he dismissed [Mr Blyth] was his disgruntlement and upset at [his] attitude in the email exchange with Mr Morison that his bonus was unfair and should be revised upwards. 

‘Mr Morison’s emails were abrupt and forthright. Mr Morison said himself that he was disgruntled and upset. There had been no further contact from Mr Morison. That was unusual.

‘That is not to say that Mr Morison might not have had in his mind on the morning of December 10, 2025 how to dress up a dismissal for that reason as a redundancy.

‘That does not mean that the operative reason in the mind of Mr Morison when he dismissed [him] on 10 December 2025 was redundancy.

‘In reaching this conclusion the Tribunal was also mindful that there was no documentary evidence that redundancy or potential redundancy of [his] position had been in Mr Morison’s mind for months as he asserted.

‘The only documentary evidence provided showed that it was only a couple of hours before [his] dismissal meeting that Mr Morison had carried out an online search about “Legitimate Reasons for Director Redundancy”.

‘The absence of any documentary evidence prior to the dismissal date was a factor which the Tribunal weighed in the balance when concluding it was more likely that Mr Morison had not been thinking about making [his] role redundant for months.’

Mr Blyth found employment in 2026, but he earns a lesser salary than he did.

It was ruled that the company should pay £118,223 in compensation to cover his financial losses during unemployment and his future losses.