Microsoft Corp. admitted Monday that it overpaid at least $100,000 in severance money for several employees after launching wide-scale layoffs last month. The Redmond-based tech giant is taking responsibility for the error and told employees to keep the extra money, according to Microsoft spokesman Lou Gellos.

Gellos said 25 people were overpaid – with an average of $4,000-5,000 per person – stretching the total figure to at least $100,000.

“Many were much lower than that,” Gellos said of the average figure. “And a few were above that.”

Gellos said “in the grand scheme of things, it’s a small amount of money.”

It was first reported that Microsoft was asking the laid-off employees for a portion of their severance back, saying that an administrative glich caused the error.

But that’s not true, Gellos said.

Lisa Brummel, Microsoft senior vice president of human resources, personally called all 25 affected former employees and “told them they did not have to send the money back,” Gellos said. “It is our error, not their error.”

Microsoft also screwed up and underpaid 20 other employees, Gellos confirmed, saying that those employees should have received a letter acknowledging the error and a check for the difference.

Microsoft laid off 1,400 employees last month and it plans to lay off up to 5,000 over the next 18 months.