A BBC executive has returned the 12,000 appearance sum amid the broadcaster's 450 job cuts.
Editorial director of the BBC Kamal Ahmed was believed to be banking as much as £12,000 for doing a 40-minute panel at Aberdeen Standard Investment's conference last week.
His big pay packet come just days after he had informed 450 of his BBC colleagues they were going to lose their jobs in the mass cull.
Ahmed has a salary between £205,000 and £209,000 as well as being listed on the Speakers Associates website for charging £10,000-25,000 per appearance, according to The Daily Mail.
He was one of four bosses present in delivering the blow 450 people would be losing their jobs.
Now the editorial director outlined he would not be taking the payment of £12K in a grovelling apology to his colleagues at the BBC via email.
The email was titled "Paid-for Event" and sent to the "News Senior Leadership" at the BBC on Tuesday at 14.12, according to records on the Mail.
In the email, he wrote: "I realise now that I did not think things through sufficiently at the time of the booking and, although I did not break any of the BBC's guidelines on external speaking, it was a mistake to agree to a fee.
"I have told ASI this morning that I will not be taking any payment. I wanted to say sorry that a mistake made by me has become a public and internal issue."
Channel 4's Steph McGovern, who used to work at the BBC, was the host of the panel in question.
The BBC said of Ahmed's appearance: "Editorial guidelines allow BBC journalists to carry out external speaking, or chairing, engagements as long as they maintain objectivity and impartiality."
It comes after the BBC axe 450 journalist jobs in a bid to save 80million to cope with the crippling financial pressures mounting.
Director of news and current affairs Fran Unsworth said: "We need to reshape BBC News for the next decade in a way which saves substantial amounts of money.
"We are spending too much of our resources on traditional linear broadcasting and not enough on digital.
"Our duty as a publicly funded broadcaster is to inform, educate, and entertain every citizen. But there are many people in this country that we are not serving well enough."
