I offered an employee $5k to quit...

I'm not sure where else to post this.... I had an employee a few years ago that couldn't be on time to anything. In office meetings, online meetings, client meetings, etc ... I finally offered him 5k to quit and move on or, fix his behavior and keep his job. The catch was, the next time he was late, he was fired and I wouldn't give him a dime. He promised me he wouldn't ever be late again. I knew he couldn't do it, I tried to convince him to take the money Quite literally the next day, he was 30 min late. What would you have done? Taken the 5k or tried to be on time?