The employees' remedy would presumably be to refuse to raise the productivity level until the bonus is made contractual. Where the bonus, stated by the employer to be a gift, is not in exchange for a quantifiable amount of extra work produced by the employee, then its true legal status is not so immediately clear cut. Two cases may illustrate this. First, in a case heard in 1954, the employer wrote to his secretary, stating that instead of a rise in salary, he proposed to pay her each year a bonus on the net trading profits of the previous financial year (clearly, the level of profits would not be dependent on her exertions, so the bonus was not for her extra work towards this end). The secretary replied that the "idea of a yearly bonus is very considerate and one which I much appreciate." Bonuses were paid from 1946 to 1951, but the employer refused to pay a bonus for 1952 and 1953 on the ground that no firm promise had been made, and even if it had been made, it was too vague to be legally enforceable. The court, however, decided that the bonus was contractual. The intention of the parties, according to the judge, was not that the payment of a bonus should be within the discretion of the employer, but that he should pay the secretary a reasonable sum relating to trading profits.