OPINION
Adkins Services, Inc. appeals from a judgment notwithstanding the verdict in its suit against Tisdale Company, Inc. and Lloyd Tisdale to collect for services rendered. Adkins contends that the trial court erred by granting “death penalty” sanctions against it, that the court erred by refusing to admit evidence that Fairmech Industries had orally assigned its claim against Tisdale to Adkins, and that the jury’s award of only $20,000.00 in damages is against the great weight and preponderance of the evidence.
Adkins sued Tisdale, alleging that Tisdale had failed to pay a debt it owed to Fairmech Industries and that Fairmech had assigned its claim to Adkins. Fairmech is a foreign corporation that provided unskilled and semi-skilled workers for Tisdale’s overseas operations. Tisdale is a specialty air conditioning and heating service that provides special applications systems. In this instance, the job was in connection with building offshore drilling platforms for Hyundai or Daewoo. Adkins first complains that the trial court effectively entered death penalty sanctions against it by refusing to permit it to introduce evidence about Fairmech’s oral assignment to Adkins of its cause of action against Tisdale. Adkins intended to prove the assignment by testimony from Ramesh Kapur. Kapur was a former employee of Tisdale, who was described as a project manager working with Fairmech on the project at issue. Kapur testified on a bill of exceptions that a representative of Fairmech assigned him the right to receive payment of its invoices sent to Tisdale and assigned to Adkins the right to pursue a lawsuit in order to recover on those invoices. The only other witness called by Adkins was one of the officers of Tisdale Company, Lloyd Tisdale. No representative of Fairmech appeared at trial.
