What was Kroger's financial arrangement with SpongeTech? My company is a fairly substantial long-term vendor ($3.5 million per year with a 25 year relationship) for Kroger and under no terms would we be in a position to owe them money.
The only conditions where we would provide a credit to their account would be if we invoiced them for more product than was actually delivered (but that would be discovered within the payment terms and would result in a short pay from them to us) or if we sent them defective product (and if discovered outside of the payment terms would result in a credit against a future invoice).
Kroger is a pretty well run establishment and I have a hard time believing they put themselves in a position of having one of their vendors owe Kroger money.