A GERMAN insurance company rewarded its top sales staff in 2007 with a trip to Budapest – where they were invited to take part in a mass orgy.

The German newspaper Handelsblatt reports that the event was held at the Gellert Thermal Baths in Budapest, which were transformed into an “open air brothel”. It involved 100 guests, and 20 prostitutes.

The prostitutes wore colour coded arm-bands – white was reserved for the attention of the top performing salesmen and board members – and the guests were invited to “do whatever they liked” with the women on four-poster beds that were draped with towels.

“After each such encounter the women were stamped on the lower arm in order to keep track of how often each woman was frequented,” the paper quoted one guest as saying.

The company which organised the event, Ergo, is part of Munich Re, the world’s biggest reinsurer, the BBC reports. Ergo is the second biggest primary insurer in Germany.

A spokesman for Ergo told Bloomberg that this isn’t its usual way of rewarding staff, and was a “clear violation” of company policy.

Senior management who organised the trip have since left the company, a spokeswoman added.