The bankrupt chain successfully argued that its factory relationships are critical to its business model and, unless it was allowed to immediately pay them on outstanding invoices, the factories would refuse to ship critical Back-to-School merchandise, causing significant damage to the chain’s ability to emerge from Chpater 11 protection. The court approved an order to pay up to $52 million on an interim basis and a total amount that could ultimately reach $113 million. Payless estimates that it has some $250 million in total accounts payable as of the filing, of which $240 million were classified as trade claims.

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