Book distributor Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group Inc temporarily stopped shipping books to Borders Group Inc after the bookstore chain said it would delay payments to some vendors, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

When a customer of that size calls you up and says you aren't getting a check, that's a piece of information you have to act on, Jed Lyons, Chief Executive of Rowman & Littlefield, told the newspaper.

Borders said on December 30 it was delaying payments to some of its vendors. The news came just weeks after the company said it was trying to obtain new financing to avoid violating the terms of its credit agreements early next year.

Lyons told the Journal he wanted more information from Borders, and that the bookseller had previously been paying us like clockwork.

Borders and Rowman & Littlefield could not be immediately been reached for comment.

(Reporting by Jessica Hall; editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)