I accepted a counteroffer once and it ended up being a huge mistake. The company was struggling and they felt they couldn't lose me etc, it was near the end of

I accepted a counteroffer once and it ended up being a huge mistake. The company was struggling and they felt they couldn't lose me etc, it was near the end of the year and everyone was already upset because it was announced that we wouldn't receive end of year/xmas bonus'. After I accepted the counter-offer I was at a lunch xmas party for our team (around 15 of us) and one person said to 'thank god this isn't a going away lunch for rick (me).', to which everyone was like 'you were going to leave???'. I was the tech lead so this news hit the other devs hard... at some point i was chatting with a few different employees (non-devs) and they said to me 'so you had to go get another job to force them to give you a raise, good move', to which I just smiled and didn't know what to say back and finally threw out 'I suppose so'. The next work day - monday 12/24 - I'm working from home and I get a call from HR; they fired me over the phone on xmas-eve, apparently the 3 employees I had the late conversation with went to HR and claimed I was bragging about the raise and that the only way to get a raise at the company was to get another job and threaten to leave. No amount of explaining that's not happened would appease them, and as they put it they had '3 peoples word against just you'. So yeah I will never accept a count-offer again!